


The Very Best of Times

by Moranion



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: (who is annoying as fuck to write tbh), Baby Watson, Divorce, F/F, F/M, First Kiss, First Time, Happy Ending, Happy Ending for Everyone, John Watson returns home, M/M, Past Mary Morstan/John Watson, Sherlock Being Sherlock, Sherlock Holmes and Feelings, Sherlock Loves John, no really
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-04
Updated: 2015-06-04
Packaged: 2018-04-02 22:03:44
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 24,009
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4075408
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Moranion/pseuds/Moranion
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John and Mary get divorced, but it doesn't really go the way divorces are supposed to go. In fact, nothing happens the way it's supposed to happen, but it still works out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Very Best of Times

**Author's Note:**

> This story was born sometime last fall, when I got angry about the general assumption that Mary either had to die or be a villain in order for John and Sherlock to get together, either in fic or in the show. So I set out to prove that I could do it better. As it usually goes, it had stopped being about proving anything to anyone about 1k into the story, and here I am with 25k of feel-good fic. There's some angst in there, too; not much, just a pinch. Still, I like to imagine I kept things realistic. 
> 
> Standard warning applies: This is a Mary-positive story. If that offends you in any way, you're welcome to click the back button now. I'd also ask you that you keep discussions about Mary's potential horribleness out of the comments section. You wanna argue about Mary or anything else, you can find me at moranion.tumblr.com; my askbox is always open. 
> 
> A humongous, adoring thanks to aderyn, my consiglieri as usual, who held my hand through the entire story and whipped it into shape after. <3<3<3 to you, darling, I've no idea where would my fic be without you, but probably not anywhere in public :D

When their daughter is three months old, Mary presents John with divorce papers. 

It is, for all intents and purposes, a normal day. John comes home from the clinic at five - normal. He locks their front door behind him, calls: “I’m home!” and takes off his shoes - normal. 

“Kettle’s just boiled,” Mary says from the kitchen, and she sounds warm and tired and welcoming - also normal.

John rounds a corner, smiling. Mary’s clutching a steaming mug, wearing a comfy blue jumper, smiling back - still normal, heartbreakingly so. 

Then John sees the stack of papers on the table before her, and there isn’t any chance of him pretending that they look like ordinary bills from afar. That is—

John sits down hard enough to hurt, and opens his mouth, but nothing comes out.

Mary pushes her own mug over to him, wraps his cold hands around it, and lets go with a gentle caress to his fingers. She gets up and goes to take another mug from a cupboard, and John absently thinks that she shouldn’t be doing that herself, not while she’s so tired, and she’s always tired these days. 

It feels like he’s moving on autopilot when he raises Mary’s mug and sips, but the tea is fresh and hot, and it slips down his throat like a calming exhale, unlocking his tongue.

“That might be too sweet for you, I’m always craving sugar these days.” Mary glances at him over her shoulder, pouring water in her new mug from the still steaming kettle. 

“Why?”

“Breastfeeding, probably. All those calories rushing out of me eight times a day.” She gives him a smile, digging a teabag out of the box with one hand and reaching for sugar with the other.

“No, I mean—” John takes another swallow of admittedly very sweet tea, breathes, tries again. “I mean— why?”

Mary sighs gently, stirring a heaping spoonful of sugar into her tea. She shuffles to the table and sits down again, eyes on the steam rising in gentle curls from the mug in her hands. “I know you know why, but for the sake of this conversation, let’s pretend that you don’t.” 

John grips his own mug tighter, and Mary raises her head to look at him.

“We’re not happy,” she says calmly. “You’re not happy, and I hate that. I’m not happy, either, but I would like to be.”

“I’m happy,” John says automatically.

Mary lifts her eyebrows. “Are you really?”

John hides his face behind his mug. He likes being a father - more than he’d expected, to be honest, and little Mila sleeping upstairs is a ball of warmth that he fancies he can feel through the walls. He and Mary made love two days ago, slowly and sweetly, excruciatingly gentle, breathing into each other’s mouths when they came, tangled together in the darkness - and there is still a dark mark on the left side of Mary’s neck that he kissed goodbye this morning. He even solved a case with Sherlock last week: it was a short one, solved in one day, and nobody got shot at, but he got to punch a criminal and Sherlock had been brilliant as always. It’s a good life. 

But. _But_.

Sherlock is smoking again, and he’s thinner and paler than John’s seen him in awhile, but he doesn’t have time to see him more than once a week, and even if Mary’s always inviting him over for dinner, Sherlock never comes. There’s still no actual sign of Moriarty, but Sherlock is dealing with the whole mess on his own, and John’s heart hurts. And last week, Sherlock asked him to come back to 221b for tea, and he’d declined, because it was late and there was only so much childcare Mary could shoulder herself. Sherlock’s face fell, and John wanted—

“You cycle to work,” Mary says. “And you keep your shirts folded.”

“That doesn’t mean—”

“You say _I’m going home for a bit_ whenever you go visit Sherlock.” Mary is watching him with crushing patience. “I don’t think you even realize you’re saying it.”

John has nothing to say to that. _Home_ is Baker Street with Sherlock in it, and he has to adjust his mental image every time he hears the word. True enough, he didn’t know it seeped out of him quite so obviously. “This is my home too,” he tries, but he barely sounds convincing to his own ears.

“You’ve tried to make it yours. I’m grateful for that.” Mary takes a sip of tea and sighs. “I know that I’ve made a mess of things,” she says quietly. 

“Is that what this is about? I told you, I warned you I’m still angry and that it’s going to be something we have to work through. I _told_ you—”

“But you’re never going to stop being angry, John. And you don’t trust me. You have to consciously remind yourself that it’s okay to trust me, and it’s not getting any better, and I can see it in your face all the time and it’s excruciating.” Mary’s mouth twists into an unhappy line. “And the worst of it is that I can’t blame you for it. I should’ve told you so much sooner, I see that now.”

“Why didn’t you?” 

“I told David, you know.” Mary’s eyebrows draw together. “Not all of it, but enough. He left me a few days after. Fairly amicably, of course, and I trusted him to keep my secret. But he was still afraid to sleep next to me at night.”

“You should’ve told me.” John’s voice shakes. His heart feels like it’s shaking, too.

“I know. You’re made of sterner stuff.” Mary clings to her mug, eyes suspiciously bright. “I wanted to keep you so badly. Which isn’t a rational reason, but there you have it.”

“Mary, I love you.” John reaches across the table to grab her hand. “I love you, okay?” He does. He’s here, isn’t he?

“I know.” Mary turns her hand and returns his grip. “I love you too. You think I don’t? That’s why we’re having this conversation. I’m trying to make it right, John. And I’d like you to have the chance to make it right, too.”

“Make _what_ right?”

Mary reaches across the table to cover his hand with hers. “You need to be with Sherlock. You two belong together in a way that, frankly, boggles my mind.” 

John stares at her, speechless. 

Mary gives him a watery smile. “He makes you _feel_ so much. You—you have no idea how you look at him. You light up whenever you see him, or even if you’re just telling me about him.” A tear finally slips down her cheek and she reaches up with her free hand to bat it away. “At first I thought it was just because you were so glad that he was alive, but then ...” She shakes her head ruefully. “You’ve never looked at me like that, John.”

“I love you,” John repeats. His throat has closed up, and his voice has been reduced to a hoarse whisper. 

“But you love him more.” Mary sits up straighter and wipes her eyes again. “I can’t be your second best, John. It isn’t fair to either of us, most of all to Mila. She doesn’t deserve to see us staying together until we sour beyond repair.”

John clutches at her hand, feeling something sharp making its way up his throat. “Please don’t,” he says. “Don’t leave me.”

Mary squeezes back. “I’m not leaving you,” she says. “I’ll be the mother of your daughter, and I’ll be your friend. I just can’t be your wife anymore.”

John opens his mouth, but there are no words. Mary looks at him and something in his face brings her around the table.

“John.” She lays her hands on his cheeks. “Oh, John, don’t.”

But John does. He hides his face into her jumper, smells her soap and her sweat and Mila, and cries. 

***

John packs a bag next morning, with Mary sitting on the bed with Mila in her arms, watching him. 

“You don’t need to move out straight away,” Mary says quietly, for the third time in the last ten minutes.

“I know.” John opens a drawer and comes face to face with his neatly folded shirts. He huffs and takes five of them from the top of the pile. “But I—I have to leave. I have to ... rewire my brain. Get some air.” He sends her a dry smile over his shoulder. “Well. A lot of air.”

Mary scoots over the bed and holds his bag open with one hand when he puts the shirts in. “Promise me you won’t waste money on some stupid hotel room. Just go back to Baker Street, okay? You have a home there.”

“I can’t—” John sighs and goes back to the dresser for his socks. “I can’t just—appear there and announce that I’m moving back in. It’s Sherlock’s flat now, I should—”

“I phoned him while you were in the shower.” Mila squeals and waves her tiny arms, and Mary shushes her gently. “I asked if you could come stay over for a few days, and he said _yes, obviously_.” She smiles. “I told you he misses you. You can tell him in person that you’d like to move back in. And why, of course.”

“Okay. Okay, Mary—” John drops the socks into his bag and pinches the bridge of his nose. “You know what, this is insane. We’ve literally just split up, _hours ago_ , and we’re, what - talking about _Sherlock_? We’ve ... arrangements to make, we need to talk about Mila—”

“I’ll take custody, since that flat is a death zone, and you can have as many visitation days as you want. Once she grows up enough to no longer be a danger to herself, we can switch to joint custody.” Mary holds Mila closer, and looks at him over her soft tuft of hair with a vaguely amused smile. 

“You’ve thought this through, haven’t you?” John looks away and starts folding his jeans.

“Don’t change the subject. I’m not divorcing you just so you two can keep on pining for each other, so start using your brain, John.”

“I don’t know if you remember, but he faked his death once and left me behind for two bloody years, why—what makes you so sure he—”

“Loves you?” Mary’s smile grows a touch wider, but then again, she’s always liked arguing with him for some unfathomable reason. “He announced it to everybody at the wedding, remember? Besides ...” She sobers up. “You didn’t see his face when we pulled you out of that bonfire, but I did.”

John saw it too, that horrible Christmas evening, and the memory’s still fresh. “Look, I—I know that he cares, okay? I know. I just don’t think that—” John stuffs the jeans into the bag with unnecessary force. “Besides, I don’t even know what I—if I want—” He gives up on words and makes an annoyed gesture with both hands. 

“You’re not gay,” Mary says helpfully. “You’ve proven that to me. Extensively, I might add.”

“Exactly!” bursts out of John. “And I don’t think that he wants—”

“Bisexuality is a real thing, John. Besides, I think I know what your problem is,” Mary interrupts him thoughtfully, and her grin is now unquestionably smug. “You keep thinking about being ‘gay’ and .. having sex with some faceless man? With chains and whips for afters? Which can all be very beautiful, but in any case, you need to work up to it. So. That’s what you mean when you say that you’re not gay.”

John’s ears feel hot. “Yes, well.” He coughs and refolds a pair of pants. “Your point being?”

“Well, don’t you want to hold _Sherlock_ close?” Mary’s voice softens. “Kiss him, tell him how much he means to you?”

John’s hands still. “He wouldn’t want me to,” he says. 

“You can’t know that,” Mary points out gently. “But that’s not what I asked you.”

John closes his eyes and swallows. “I don’t know,” he says. “I—I really don’t. It’s too—too abstract.” He opens his eyes and slowly puts the pile of pants into the bag. “He wouldn’t want me to,” he repeats.

“Are you really going to rest a decision like that on such an uncertain fact?” Mary sighs, kisses the top of Mila’s hair. “You need to get this sorted, John.”

John throws his toiletries on the top of the clothes and zips the bag shut. “Can we stop talking about this?” he pleads. “I can’t deal with—with getting bloody _divorced from you_ and whatever the hell is between Sherlock and me at the same time, okay? This is a bloody nightmare as it is, so how about we get divorced first and talk about everything else later?”

Mary gets up from the bed and walks to him. “I was trying to distract us both, actually,” she says and puts Mila into his arms. “Besides, it _is_ important.” 

“I know,” John mutters and pushes his nose into Mila’s hair. “I know. Just ... not now, please?”

Mary nods slowly. “Okay.” She wraps her arms around them both and presses her face against John’s shoulder. “Mila will be fine,” she whispers. “You and I will be fine. I promise. We’ll be fine.”

***

“You home?” John calls out, hauling his bag through the door, and Sherlock sticks his head around the corner from kitchen.

“That’s too heavy for ‘a couple of days’.” He frowns and comes from behind the glass partition. “At least one week’s worth of clothing, another pair of shoes.” The assessing look makes it all the way to John’s face and Sherlock stills. “You haven’t slept. Not just that, you’ve been crying.”

John grimaces. “We’re splitting up.”

Sherlock blinks. “I’ve been informed that couples argue a lot in their first year of marriage. Surely, if you think about it rationally—”

“We’re getting a divorce, Sherlock.” 

Sherlock looks at him, bright and silent, and John has to look away. “I’m just going to get this upstairs,” he mutters. He turns and squeezes himself and the bag back through the door.

Five minutes later finds John sitting on his old bare mattress, warily looking around. He hasn’t lived here for four years, and yet, the room is utterly familiar, and even stripped bare as it is, being here feels like a long, relieved exhale. He doesn’t seem to have forgotten anything about it. He looks at his old window and remembers that the summer sunlight will crawl across his face and wake him at seven in the morning. The closet door is gaping slightly - it needs to be lifted a bit in order to close properly, but whoever was here last doesn’t know it. Sherlock? All the surfaces are clear of dust, so Mrs Hudson is more likely. 

There’s an uncharacteristically hesitant knock on the door, and John sighs.

“Since when do you knock?” he asks, and Sherlock comes in. 

He coughs, then puts his hands behind his back and looks intently at John. “Are you alright?”

John blinks at him. Sherlock usually doesn’t ask him that, not without some immediate lethal danger involved. “I’m fine,” he says automatically.

Sherlock scoffs. “You’re upset. And you won’t tell me what’s going on.”

“What do you mean, _what’s going on?_ ” John lifts his eyebrows. “I told you. Mary’s got the request for divorce drawn up and we’ve signed it. I guess we could still withdraw it, legally speaking, but we won’t change our minds about it. So, there’s nothing _going on_ , it’s already happened.”

“Obviously,” Sherlock drawls, “but why? You’ve already been through worse problems than a vast majority of couples, so what’s happened now?”

John licks his lips. He thinks, wildly, of Mary, pale and skirting the edge of tears, _you have never looked at me like that_. He thinks of opening his mouth and telling Sherlock what exactly she’d said to him. Then the moment passes and John clears his throat. “Apparently, we didn’t make it all the way through. Mary said that I wasn’t going to stop being angry at her, that I was never going to trust her again, and that it’s making us both too unhappy to go on.”

“Is that true?” Sherlock demands. 

John sighs. “True enough. I couldn’t deny it with a clear conscience, anyway.”

Sherlock gazes at him for a moment longer, then abruptly looks away and sits down on the edge of the mattress beside John. “I’m sorry,” he offers, tapping a nervous rhythm on the floor with his left foot. 

John cracks a smile and nudges Sherlock’s shoulder with his own. “Thanks, I guess. But it was really very amicable. We’ve agreed to stay friends and everything. So you don’t have to be worried about anything.”

“Who said I was worried?” Sherlock sniffs and stands up. “Lunch?”

“Bit early, but I won’t say no.” John gets up as well. “You’re eating as well.”

“I’m not hungry.” Sherlock starts descending the stairs before him.

John stops him with a hand on his shoulder. Standing a few steps lower, Sherlock is, for once, looking up at John instead of down, and the effect is slightly disconcerting. His eyes look bigger - a bit too big and innocent to be natural, in fact, and John narrows his own eyes suspiciously.

“When was the last time you ate?”

“Really, John, that’s not necessary.”

“Just answer the question, Sherlock.”

Sherlock sighs impatiently. “I forgot. A couple days, probably.”

“Right.” John gently pushes him to start walking again. “We’re going to Angelo’s, and you’re eating a proper meal.”

Astonishingly enough, Sherlock doesn’t offer a word of protest. 

***

First night back home, John sleeps like the dead.

In the morning, he’s annoyed to find out that Sherlock’s gone out without telling him, but just when he’s about to put the kettle on, the bastard in question bursts in. Eyes aglow, hair blown into a storm cloud, cheeks flushed, Sherlock throws John’s jacket at his face, and he grins like he’s gone feral overnight.

“We have a lead on Moriarty. Come on, _come on!_ ”

He’s almost through the door again when he notices that John hasn’t moved, and turns around. “John?” He clears his throat. “Would you like to come with me, please?” 

John puts his jacket on. “Don’t be an idiot,” he says. “I always want to come with you.”

Sherlock’s relief is so obvious that it makes John feel warm all over. “Come on, then.”

And hours later, when the summer night falls on the city, and the lead turns out to be hollow, Sherlock puts his gloves on and looks at John, and his eyes catch the streetlights. 

“Dinner?” he asks.

John returns the look, and _God_ , he can say it, he’s finally allowed to say it: “Starving.”

***

Mrs Hudson fusses over John every day, even when he tries to reassure her, again and again, that the breakup amicable. Still, she hugs him and pats his hand and brings them both tea almost every day for the first week John’s back at Baker Street, and Sherlock never complains about it, not for one second, not even when he’s covered the entire kitchen table with Erlenmeyer flasks full of blood in various stages of coagulation and Mrs Hudson shifts them aside herself to put the tea tray on the table. Sherlock stands by, visibly twitchy at somebody else touching his experiments, but he never says a word against it. 

Lestrade stops by a few days after John’s arrival, hands Sherlock a pile of cold case files and drags John to the nearest pub for a pint and a measure of good old-fashioned awkward back-patting. He seems immeasurably relieved when John, a bit out of patience at this point, explains that _no, for the tenth time, it was amicable, and no, I’m not about to slit my wrists in despair_. So they talk about rugby instead, and John finds out how Sherlock made a rookie officer actually, properly cry at a crime scene three weeks ago. John wasn’t there to see it for himself, and the absence of a memory that should’ve existed scratches at his brain. John comes home late, drunk, and to the soft waves of violin slowly, tenderly permeating the air. It’s almost like Sherlock wants him to fall asleep with ease, and John does exactly that. 

In short, life is remarkably like it was years ago, before the deaths and weddings and rooftops, and it worries John, the ease with which he settles back into their life; how the flat expands and envelops him and is _their_ flat again; how the light and the smells and the noises are so familiar and comforting that he doesn’t even need to get used to it all again. But most of all, it’s worrying how happy John is to have Sherlock close again. He didn’t even realize how worried he was about Sherlock, _all the time_ , and being suddenly relieved of that worry is strangely exhilarating.

Of course, that means he has more place in his thoughts to worry about Mila and Mary and the divorce, but Sherlock keeps him busy, and suddenly, two weeks have gone by.

Mary comes to visit him on a Monday morning, when John doesn’t have a shift at the clinic and Sherlock is conveniently absent from the flat, with Mila tucked in a carrier on her chest and a nappy bag over her shoulder.

Mila lets out a squeak and starts kicking her tiny legs as soon as she sees John, but Mary looks pale and wispy and sad, and John takes a spit second to decide that their newly separated status doesn’t matter when it comes to offering apparently much needed comfort, so he stands up and goes to wrap his hands around them both. 

“I’m fine,” Mary says, but doesn’t move away.

“You don’t look fine.” John presses a kiss to Mila’s head.

“Well, you know. I’m not okay, but I’m coping.” She offers him a colourless smile when he steps back. “I will be fine eventually. How are you?”

“I’m—” John falters. He’s got Sherlock. He can’t claim to feel as bad as Mary must be feeling. “Coping?”

“You have Sherlock,” Mary says with a sigh. “Just goes to show I was right.”

“Can we not—” John pinches the bridge of his nose. “Please go sit down, I’ll make tea.”

So he makes tea, and they talk in stilted, broken bursts of days they’re not sharing any longer. The kitchen sink was clogged, Mary says. John’s seen a lot of ear infections at the clinic. Mary’s thinking of repainting the living room. John can’t get Sherlock to stop smoking again. Mila’s still not sleeping through the night. Mary’s stopped eating chocolate cereal for breakfast, because she wants to drop the baby weight.

“I hate it,” Mary suddenly says fiercely, and John looks up from Mila in his lap. “I hate it so much, John.”

“The cereal?” John ventures, a bit confused. “It’s really not—”

“Not the bloody cereal, John, I hate what I’ve made my life into.” She clutches at her mug and looks at him, green eyes glinting like he hasn’t seen them in months. “I hate being a happy little housewife. I would’ve done it, because we were a family, and I haven’t had that for decades. And look at us now.”

John looks at her, feeling helpless. “It’s just until Mila can go to daycare,” he offers tentatively. “Then you were going to go back to work, like we’ve agreed.”

“I know. _I know_.” Mary angrily swipes a tear away. “It’s not your fault, John, I—I was done with my old life, I was so done with all of it. I wanted normal life, I wanted a family to call my own, I wanted—” Her voice breaks, and she covers her face with her hands. “I wanted to be happy for once,” she mutters almost soundlessly. “No such luck.”

“Mary.” John shifts Mila in his arms and reaches across the table to wrap his fingers around Mary’s forearm. “Mary, don’t, please.”

She drops her hands with a hitched sigh. “Maybe I’m broken,” she says with a humourless laugh. “No normal life for ex-assassins.”

“And no normal life for ex-soldiers,” John mutters to himself.

“What a pair we make,” Mary says, and John realizes he’d said it out loud. She sniffles and rubs at her eyes. “I wonder if—no. No use in wondering now.”

John shifts his hand down to her own and squeezes it. He wants to kiss her unhappily pursed mouth until it stops being unhappy, but that’s not really an option now.

“Don’t even think about it,” Mary says with a wry smile, and John flushes. “Talk about counterproductive.”

“I know, I’m sorry.” John looks down at their hands. “I don’t know what to do,” he says. “We should be throwing plates at each other and screaming. That kind of stuff. Isn’t that what people are supposed to do when they’re getting divorced?”

“Guess we’re hardly ‘people’ by this point.” Mary squeezes his hand in answer. “You’re still wearing your ring.”

“So are you,” John mutters. He’d stared at it every morning for the past two weeks, trying to bring himself to take it off. He wonders now if Mary’s had the same troubles, or if it hasn’t even occurred to her yet to take it off.

But Mary’s smiling now, at least gently if not happily, and she puts her hands flat on the table. “Here,” she says. “I’ll do yours if you do mine.”

John swallows and reaches for her fingers. She’s gained some weight, and the ring won’t slide off her finger until he twists it around and gently works it off. He drops it on the table between them and lays his own left hand beside it.

Mary’s little hands - so steady, John’d always wondered how she’d got such steady hands when they’d first met - are trembling slightly now, working his own ring off his finger. He’s gained weight, too. 

Mila squeals and squirms in the crook of John’s right arm, and Mary drops his ring on the table with a clink, right beside hers. Two little golden circles sit there, glinting in the morning sun, and John thinks, slightly hysterically, that they look almost new, still polished and pretty.

“We haven’t even been married long enough for them to get worn,” Mary echoes quietly. 

John nods. He wonders what’re they supposed to do with them. Throw them away? Keep them for nostalgic purposes? 

“How do people do this?” he says aloud, and then the kitchen door bursts open and Sherlock walks in.

John’s struck with a horrific urge to laugh at the situation, but Sherlock abruptly looks almost terrified. 

“Oh,” he says, sounding lost. “Excuse me. I didn’t mean—”

“It’s okay, Sherlock.” Mary gets up and hugs him, which shuts him up impressively quickly. 

“Are you alright?” he asks uncertainly, hugging back. “You’ve been crying.” 

The default question for the Watsons, John thinks ruefully, except that one’s set to become former Watson soon. 

“I’m okay, Sherlock, I’m always crying these days,” she says, muffled by his chest. “It’s not a big deal. How about you?”

“I’m quite sure you aren’t the one who’s supposed to be asking this question,” Sherlock says, and Mary snorts and lets him go. 

“I must say, your timing’s impeccable,” she says. “We were just having a moment, so thank god you interrupted us.”

But Sherlock’s staring at Mila, and John realizes that he hasn’t actually seen her again since he held her in the hospital on the day she was born. It’d been a sight John never expected to see: Sherlock shocked into absolute silence by the tiny bundle in his arms. Since then, Sherlock hasn’t come to visit them despite numerous invitations, and even if John’s been snapping photos of his daughter and sending them to Sherlock and the rest of their friends almost every day, a photo on the phone is hardly the same as seeing her in person again.

“D’you want to hold her?” John gets up. 

“She’s grown,” Sherlock mutters, and then snaps his mouth shut and holds his arms out.

John goes around the table and hands Mila to him. Sherlock nestles her into the crook of his elbow and resumes gazing at her. Mila, not one to be upstaged, stares seriously back at him. 

“She looks so small when you’re holding her,” Mary says, voicing John’s thoughts. 

Sherlock doesn’t even bother looking up. “Hello,” he says to Mila. “You probably don’t remember me, but we’ve met before.”

John snorts. “You do know she can’t understand you yet? Pity, I haven’t seen you this polite in ages.”

“Don’t listen to your dad,” Sherlock tells Mila, bending his head lower and beaming at her. “I’m sure you don’t care about boring old things such as being polite.”

Mila agrees, and proves it by plunging her tiny hand into Sherlock’s fringe and pulling. Quite hard, too, judging by Sherlock’s startled yelp.

“She loves pulling my hair, too,” Mary comments, grinning. “So I guess you’re right, she really isn’t polite.”

“New experiences are crucial at her age,” Sherlock says through gritted teeth. He reaches up and gently detangles her fingers from his hair. “Now,” he says decisively and lifts his head, with Mila now clutching his fingers. “We’ll make a deal. You need to stay away from my hair for the next few months, until you learn how not to pull so hard. Agreed? Agreed.”

“Good luck with that, ” John says wryly.

“I resent that attitude.” Sherlock sails past him and settles in his armchair. He dangles the fringe of his scarf above Mila’s head. “Enjoy,” he says, and Mila screeches with glee and pulls on the blue wool. 

John hears the faint ripping sounds and winces, but Sherlock’s smiling down at her in delight.

“You’re in luck that I don’t care about this particular scarf,” he tells her. Mila’s gnawing on the fringes and beaming up at him.

John’s and Mary’s Christmas gift to Sherlock the previous year had also been a scarf - similar to the one Mila’s currently hellbent on destroying, also blue, but darker; John’s unexpectedly happy to hear that Sherlock doesn’t care about this particular scarf. 

“Good, she adores you,” Mary sighs with audible relief. “I was going to ask John to take care of her for the day, and you already seem to have it handled. Both of you are going to be home until evening, yeah? Brilliant.” 

John nervously licks his lips, abruptly feeling guilty for the last fortnight. “Mary, I’m sorry you had to deal with her on your own for two weeks, I didn’t want—”

“It’s okay, John,” she interrupts him briskly, then looks up from her purse and catches the look on his face. Her eyes soften. “I mean it, it’s okay,” she says. “We knew this was going to happen, remember? We’ll work out some kind of schedule, and this was a freak occurrence, just to give us both some breathing time.”

“Okay,” John agrees uncertainly.

“Now I need help, and I’m asking for it. Nod your head,” she instructs, and John nods. “Good. I’ve packed the formula and nappies and some toys, it’s all in the bag.” She looks at her watch. “It’s almost eleven now. I’ll come get her around seven. Breathe, John, you’ve done this before, remember?”

John nods mutely, a bit ashamed for being so reluctant, and Mary turns to Sherlock. 

“No murder talk, understood?”

Sherlock sets his jaw mutinously, and Mary rolls her eyes.

“Not yet, okay? She needs to understand morality first, then you can get her excited over blood splatters and shaky alibis.” 

“You two do know that she’s not even four months old, right?” John asks incredulously, and is smoothly ignored. 

“We’ll be fine, Mary,” Sherlock says. “John functions better under pressure, he’ll be stellar.”

“It’s not pressure, it’s our fucking baby.” Mary goes to kiss Mila’s head and coo at her for a few seconds, then squeezes Sherlock’s shoulder and straightens up. “You have my number,” she says and gives John a quick hug before shrugging her jacket on. “I bet you won’t need it, but just in case.”

“Right,” John says, and Mary rolls her eyes again, but she’s smiling now.

She disappears down the stairs with a final wave, and John clears his throat and turns around. Sherlock’s grinning down at Mila, who seems to be having the time of her life chewing on his scarf; he’s tugging at the fabric to make it twitch and dance in her grasp and she’s shrieking excitedly, grabbing at it with her little fists.

John coughs again, feeling suddenly superfluous to the scene. “Well, you seem to have to handled perfectly,” he says. “I’ll just ... go make some more tea, alright?”

Sherlock looks up, looking surprised. “I’m sorry?” he offers uncertainly. “Did I—Did I do it wrong? I thought—”

John rubs at his eyes and exhales a weary laugh. It’s crazy, begrudging Sherlock his ease with Mila, but the sight of the two of them together is making John’s chest feel tight, and what else could that be if not jealousy in the face of John himself continually feeling like a failure when it comes to fatherhood? 

“Christ, no, Sherlock, I’m sorry,” he says. He walks over to perch on the armrest and strokes Mila’s hair, and she smiles at him past the blue wool in her toothless mouth. “I’m being an idiot. You’re amazing. She’ll be around often enough, I’m thrilled you like each other.”

Sherlock blinks up at him. “I’m amazing for playing with a baby?”

John snorts. “She’s drooled all over your scarf, Sherlock. I’d think you’d be livid.”

“I don’t care about this scarf,” Sherlock repeats, looking back down. “And she likes it.”

Mila agrees with an enthusiastic squeak, and John smiles. “How about that tea?” he offers, and Sherlock nods, distracted.

John goes back to the kitchen. He makes tea, and stares at the pair of wedding rings on the table.

It’s only later that day, after Mila’s been feed and changed several times, and played violin to, and been cooed at by Mrs Hudson, and been lectured on the effect of music on child development, and is finally contentedly napping in Sherlock’s lap while Sherlock grumbles at the telly, when John starts taking stuff out of the fridge to make some dinner for Sherlock and himself, that he notices that the rings have disappeared. 

He stomps into the living room and earns a dirty look from Sherlock. 

“She sleeps tighter than you, and you can sleep through me shouting at you,” John whispers fiercely. “What did you do with the rings? I know it was you, nobody else’s been here since this morning.” 

Sherlock furrows his eyebrows. “I put them in your dresser, in the outer right corner of your second drawer, under your dress socks. I didn’t want them to get lost.”

John sighs, exasperated. “You’ve indexed my socks again. Brilliant.”

He means to check the drawer later in the evening, when he goes to bed, and forgets, and doesn’t remember again.

***

John’d thought that Sherlock’s death was the worst thing to happen to him, that nothing could possibly trump it. After his two years of mourning had been made irrelevant, he had decided, quite simply, that he was going to die before Sherlock. It wasn’t really a plan as much as a decision to never let himself feel that kind of pain ever again.

Then Sherlock went and murdered Magnussen, and ... frankly, it was a laughable situation, because of course Sherlock would manage to upstage himself and do something worse than faking his death. 

For the next two weeks, John listened to the screams of helpless rage echoing in his head. Later, he doesn’t remember much beyond that, and Mary’s arms wrapped around him at every possible opportunity, and Mycroft’s dead, hopeless voice over the phone. _“There’s nothing I can do. I’m being watched very closely. Please don’t shout at me, our mother has already taken care of that for today.”_ The helplessness was the worst. John had no idea where Sherlock was, what was in store for him; he didn’t even know if he was alive or if the government had quietly— John couldn’t even think it to himself. All he knew was that Sherlock had managed to abandon him again, and this time, John didn’t even have the hollow comfort of apparent death.

By the time news actually came, Mary’d taken over the Mycroft-badgering duties. John was staring into his cooling tea while Mary’s shouting shook the walls. He didn’t have the strength to wonder what Mycroft had said to her to bring out such anger, or to worry when her voice quieted down, became blank and defeated.

Finally she walked into their kitchen, pale as a sheet, and sat down hard on the chair across from John. For a long moment, they stared at each other.

“They’re sending him on a suicide mission.” Mary’s knuckles were white where she was still clutching the phone. “Mycroft wouldn’t use the expression, of course, but I spent enough time dealing with secret service types to know what’s going on.”

It felt like being choked, or rather like his lungs’d forgotten how to inhale. John let go of the mug and pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes. _It’s happening again_ —sour tinge of hysteria— _how is it happening again?_

“You pull a trick like this, and they send you on a mission. Nothing official, you’re just supposed to die and spare them the trouble.” Mary’s voice was still carefully blank, but there was an underlying tremor to it that pierced through John’s chest. 

“No.” His palms came down with with a slap on the table. “No. That can’t possibly—no.”

Mary grabbed his hands. “John—”

“Jesus.” He squeezed his eyes shut. “God, no. _No._ ”

“ _Listen to me!_ ” Mary snapped, digging her short nails into his skin. “Listen. I got Mycroft to agree that we can see Sherlock before he leaves.”

John struggled to draw a breath. “Fuck. Oh, Jesus. When?”

“Tomorrow morning. They’ll be picking us up at eight.”

“Tomorrow. _Jesus_.”

“Listen to me.” Mary squeezed his fingers, hard enough for him to wince reflexively. “Sherlock’s _smart_ , okay? He’s a bloody genius, we all know it. He can survive out there. Hell, he did it before, for two years.” 

“But— _a suicide mission_ —”

“They’re throwing him into a snake nest and hoping the snakes solve the problem for them. He may make it through, in their reasoning, but it’s unlikely. But he _can_.” Mary stared at him, green eyes dark and burning in her pale face. “He lives to defy probabilities, John. He’ll survive.”

John swallowed. His throat felt impossibly narrow. “If he doesn’t—”

“We won’t think about _if_ ,” Mary said fiercely. “Listen to me. Mycroft isn’t stupid. He’s buying time. Sherlock only needs to last long enough for Mycroft to gain some leverage, for the dust to settle. And he’ll be able to help Sherlock, like he can’t right now.”

“How long?”

“A few months, maybe half a year.” Mary sighed and hung her head, breathed in and out. “Now. What _you_ can do for Sherlock is get yourself under control.”

John nodded, breathed. The crisis response was kicking in. “In the morning ...”

“We’ll see him, and we’ll do our best to not make him worry about us. He needs to focus on staying alive. He can’t afford distractions. Thinking about home will get him killed.” Mary’s shock sharpened into brutal focus, and a small part of John wondered if this was what she used to be like in her old life. “Try to make it clear that he’s loved, and that we expect him back. Avoid drama at all costs.”

John nodded again. A grim stillness settled over him, a few clear tasks mapped out. He could focus on those and block the rest of it out for the time being.

 _See Sherlock off. Cling to the best possibility. Don’t break._

 

***

Once the routine is established, the days start melting into each other. Mila spends three to four days a week at Baker Street, although Mary still comes to pick her up in the evening and drops her off in the morning, since she’s on maternity leave and has a car. Once John scrapes enough to get a second crib to put in his bedroom, Mila stays the night, too. She’s young enough to adapt quickly, and John can only thank his lucky stars that Sherlock, incredibly enough, likes having her around, too. He drops his old job in favour of locum work, closer to Baker Street and with fewer hours - he doesn’t have the will to keep himself from jumping every time Sherlock has a case, and the way it makes Sherlock beam at him makes it worth the hassle and the lesser income. 

He and Mary do their best to coordinate taking care of Mila with John’s work, but inevitably, the two cross each other. Mrs Hudson, who doesn’t let any chance to coo over Mila slip by, volunteers to babysit - “Just for a few days, dear, mind.” - but then, John comes home one day and finds Mila with Sherlock.

Not so much with Sherlock as on Sherlock - in a sleek, black-and-purple carrier strapped to his chest, sleeping with that blissful, carefree expression, while Sherlock himself is frowning at his murder wall, a crime scene photo in one hand and a thick black marker in another.

John gapes at the pair of them, and Sherlock turns his head to glare some more, this time at John. 

“You might want to close your mouth, John, leaving it hanging open like that makes you look a lot stupider than you actually are.”

John snaps his mouth shut. “Did you actually pick out a carrier that matches your favourite shirt?”

“Don’t be ridiculous.” Sherlock turns back to the wall. “I simply picked the least hideous one. Whoever designs these things must be either blind or completely hate parents. They had ones with patterns. _Trucks_ , John.”

John feels the beginnings of a manic laugh welling up in his throat. He swallows it down and coughs. “Well. God forbid someone might mistake Mila for a normal kid.”

“She’s not,” Sherlock mutters. “She’s very smart. By my estimations, she’ll learn to walk before she’s one year old.”

“Well,” John says again, and stops short. He doesn’t quite know how to say it, so he settles for simple. “Thank you for keeping an eye on her. I’ll do my best to find a sitter soon.”

Sherlock rolls his eyes at the wall. “A sitter. How very ... quaint.”

John frowns. “I can’t expect Mrs Hudson to babysit every time, she has her own life.”

“Don’t be an idiot, she absolutely adores her, she’d be delighted.” Sherlock makes a sharp cross over one of the papers on the wall. “And when she’s not home, I am. One of us is usually here, or will be prepared to stay home in order to take care of Mila. Hiring a sitter is a waste of money, not to mention it’ll expose your daughter to some dreadfully dull people.” 

John doesn’t point out that Sherlock adores her, too, or he wouldn’t have taken her from Mrs Hudson today, or be offering to babysit - in that carefully offhand way that John knows how to see through now. “Okay,” he says, aiming for nonchalance. “No sitter for now. We’ll see how it goes.”

Sherlock hums distractedly. He rips a photo of a severed leg off the wall and throws it on the floor. The movement jostles Mila a bit. She doesn’t even make a sound, but Sherlock cups a protective palm over the back of her head. “I apologize,” he tells her. “We all like peace when we sleep, I know.”

John doesn’t quite manage to hide his smile, but Sherlock isn’t looking at him anyway. 

And that’s how life goes on. John goes to work, takes care of Mila, goes on cases with Sherlock. Sherlock does his experiments, cleans the floor religiously even if Mila isn’t crawling yet, and takes John on cases. Mary drinks tea in their kitchen and John’s pleased to see that her shoulders are straighter and her face less pale. They talk about her job hunt, about the book she’s thinking of writing; about the most recent cases; about Mila. When Sherlock isn’t home, they talk about Sherlock. 

***

Moriarty’s trail goes cold; there’s a series of disjointed leads that turn to smoke under scrutiny, and finally they peter out into silence. Sherlock persists, examining all the evidence Mycroft’s provided time and again, but once Lestrade starts calling again, the lure of fresh murders does their job. 

Moriarty’s files sit in an open box in the corner of their living room and quietly gather dust. Sherlock keeps insisting that the man itself must be biding his time. John simply thinks that there’s no use in waiting for it with bated breath. If Moriarty’s alive and plotting, they’ll learn of it soon enough.

Life is peaceful - well, for _them_ , that is - and John thinks about it, naturally. He has time. He thinks about getting divorced because of his love for Sherlock and their old life; he thinks about moving back to Baker Street and looking at Sherlock every day and not saying anything, and not saying anything, nothing at all, week after week. He thinks about Mary, and about Mila, and about how very fucked up all this is. He thinks about the airplane turning around, and how it once again felt like Sherlock’d broken him to pieces, only to scoff at him afterwards with a dismissive _never mind then, I changed my mind_.

He knows now that he’s loved - even if he hadn’t declared it at the wedding last year, Sherlock’s been going out of his way to make him happy ever since John moved back in, taking him on cases and asking, with that heartbreaking tentativeness, “Are you alright, John?” - not just when they’ve narrowly escaped from a dangerous situation, but whenever John’s feeling down, and that’s often enough. 

He thinks about that black hole that’d been left behind three years ago after Sherlock fell out of the world, and how the hole was still there even when John thought he was done grieving, sucking the air and light into itself, and how it was always there, on the edge of his vision, tugging him towards itself. Sherlock came back, but John never stopped missing him, because everything’d changed, and they couldn’t ever go back to their life as it used to be. So the hole is still there, even now, and pieces of John disappear into it every day. There’s no going near it, because then he’d fall through. It’s the wound of knowing that there’s no John Watson without Sherlock Holmes, and it isn’t something John can ever not know.

John thinks about it, and comes to the conclusion that he’s a coward. Even now, he doesn’t have the courage to tell Sherlock that he loves him, yes, he loves him _like that_ , even if it’s still theoretical and John still isn’t gay, because their life right now is as good as it gets, and above all, it feels fragile. He doesn’t have the courage to break it open again. 

***

Mila learns how to crawl when she’s six months old, and John comes down for breakfast one morning and finds their kitchen absolutely devoid of any not-kitchen-appropriate objects. Sherlock’s microscope and lab glassware has vanished. The table is absolutely, shockingly empty. Warily, John goes to open the fridge and is welcomed by milk, butter, eggs, several kinds of jam, mustard, a bag of fresh tomatoes and a block of cheese. There is not one body part in sight.

John lets the fridge door swing shut. Just as he starts contemplating if he hasn’t gone bonkers overnight, Sherlock pads into the kitchen, yawning and rubbing his mussed hair.

“Just tea for me, thanks,” he says, sleep-hoarse, and sits down at the table. 

John turns around. “Sherlock.”

Sherlock gives an inquiring hum.

“Sherlock, where’s all your stuff?” It occurs to John, in that moment, that he never considered _Sherlock_ might want to move out of Baker Street one day. The thought is horribly chilling. Sherlock would’ve mentioned it beforehand, wouldn’t he? He wouldn’t just leave, not after everything that happened. 

Sherlock yawns again. “221c. I negotiated a small yearly rent with Mrs Hudson. She was happy about it, no need to worry. That place hasn’t been occupied for almost eight years by now. Apparently, some people are terribly bothered by insignificant things like damp and mold. As if we don’t live in an age of efficient air conditioning systems.”

John frowns. “What are you saying?”

“I’m saying I now have a proper lab downstairs, with all the _dangerous_ and _unsafe_ chemicals and equipment very safely under key, and you no longer get to complain about my body parts in the fridge.” Sherlock gives him a fuzzy, bleary smile. “No need to be worried about Mila anymore.”

He really should stop being surprised every time Sherlock does something considerate, a tiny part of John notes, because it’s been a good long while now of Sherlock making an effort, but this is still _Sherlock_. “Um,” John says very eloquently, and immediately wants to slap himself. “I mean. Thank you, that’s very ...”

Sherlock yawns again through his smile. Morning sunlight’s spilling over his face, and for a moment he looks very much like a cat, soft and smiling and crinkly-eyed. “You’re welcome, John.” He stretches and rubs at the back of his head. “Can I get some tea if you’re making it?”

John turns away and squeezes his eyes shut. “Yeah, sure,” he says. 

***

John’s been living at Baker Street for five months when the divorce’s finalized, and Mary comes around with the final batch of papers to sign and, ironically enough, a bottle of champagne. 

She opens the door in her bright red coat, waves with a folder in one hand and a bottle in another. “Come on, ex-husband,” she says brightly in lieu of a greeting. “Let’s celebrate. Sherlock! Is he home?”

John smiles, feeling the old hurt twitch faintly in his chest, and closes his laptop. Sherlock comes out of the kitchen with a Jammy Dodger sticking out of his mouth. Mary smiles at him, and he goes to hug her, for once kept mute. 

“You look happy,” John comments, giving her a quick hug as well once Sherlock lets her go, and Mary snorts.

“Of course I’m happy, I’m a free woman again.” She sets the folder and the bottle down on the kitchen table and takes her coat off. “Where’s our darling?” 

“Having a nap,” Sherlock mumbles past the crumbs, gesturing toward the baby monitor on the living room table. “Won’t be long now before we’re summoned to her chambers.”

“Won’t go wake her up now, then.” Mary gestures towards the cupboards. “Glasses?”

“On the left,” John says. He pulls the folder closer and flips it open, just to have something to look at. There’s only one set of champagne flutes in their kitchen. They’ll be drinking to their divorce from the same glasses that they used to toast to their engagement, almost two years ago now.

There’s a large hand on his shoulder, and John shakes himself and looks up.

“Have some alcohol first, I’ve been told that helps,” Sherlock says with a slight smile, and John’s mouth corners twitch up despite his mood. 

Mary lines the glasses on the table, and Sherlock pops the bottle, and then they’re looking at each other with glasses in their hands.

“I apologize,” Sherlock says with a touch of uncertainty, “but I’ve been informed that divorce is hardly something celebratory.”

Mary gives a hard, decisive grin. “To new beginnings, then,” she says, and they raise their glasses quietly and drink.

John takes a sip and lowers his own glass, just in time to see Sherlock empty his entire glass in several long swallows, his head tilted back and his throat working furiously. 

“Slow down there,” Mary says, eyebrows raised. 

Sherlock tips his head forward and grimaces faintly. “Bubbles,” he gasps. 

“I’m not an expert, but that’s a lovely champagne,” John comments. “There’s scotch if you want to get smashed real quick, no need to destroy the good stuff, plus it won’t tickle your throat to death.”

“Thank you, but that’ll do,” Sherlock says and carefully sets his glass down. “I have ... something to give you,” he continues haltingly, and Mary wrinkles her forehead at him. “Well, to give to Mila, to be exact, but she won’t be old enough for awhile, and ... to be completely honest, it’s something for all three of you.” 

They’re drinking champagne already; why not receive a present for their divorce as well? Then again, it’s from Sherlock, so it’ll probably be something wildly inappropriate that can take John’s mind off things. 

Sherlock takes a small rectangular box from his pocket. “You don’t need to keep it if you don’t like it,” he says, removing the lid, and John recognizes that nervy tone, careful enunciation - Sherlock sounded like that at the wedding, so afraid of misstepping. “I made a deal with the goldsmith, you can—sell it, or reshape it, I’ll pay for it, or—you understand. Whatever you want to do with it. But it’s for Mila, too.”

John expects him to give the box to Mary, or to himself, but Sherlock places it carefully on the table and then backs away. “Don’t be angry if I did it wrong,” he says quietly.

John steps closer, Mary doing the same on the other side of the table. In the box, there’s a small pendant: a complicated knot of entwined gold strands, in a strange shape that reminds John of a stretched-out heart.

“Is that Celtic?” Mary asks. “Looks like knotwork.”

“It’s the symbol for parental love,” Sherlock says, brighter now with approval. “Well, traditionally it stands for motherhood only, but I thought it looks enough like any parent holding their child. That’s the meaning I wish it to have for you, in any case.” 

“But you—did you have this _made_?” John reaches out and carefully picks the pendant out of its box. The style isn’t anything like, say, heavy brass and beaten silver knotwork bracelets and rings he remembers from the Camden market; it’s thin and delicate, immaculately shiny, and just a bit posh, but then again, it _is_ from Sherlock. “But—why?”

“You’ve been worried,” Sherlock says. “Both of you. You’re concerned that your divorced status might negatively affect Mila. You’re thinking that your daughter might come to resent you for never providing her with a traditional family. I expect she’ll be smarter than that, but societal prejudices are pervasive, especially for teenagers. I’ve been doing research. I confirmed my hypothesis. Children who are brought up by divorced parents are generally happy as adults and have good relationships with their parents. Certainly better than those children that grow up with parents who remain married despite their relationships being all but destroyed.”

John swallows thickly. He hasn’t the slightest idea what to say, so he just turns the pendant in his fingers. He hears Mary let out a shaky exhale.

“You have done exceptionally well in keeping your relations healthy,” Sherlock says gently. “You’ve remained friends. You care about each other, and you love your daughter.”

Mary extends her hand towards John, and he places the pendant into her palm. “Sherlock,” he starts, and comes up with nothing. He can’t believe Sherlock picked up on his worries, or Mary’s, for that matter. So much for claiming indifference to emotions. But that hasn’t been true for quite a while now, has it?

“Trust you to have a pendant custom made instead of simply walking into a jewelry shop,” Mary mutters, voice soft with shock. 

Sherlock shifts uncomfortably. “It’s made out of your wedding rings,” he mumbles and looks away. “I nicked them out of John’s sock drawer. I—I realize this is the part where you might get angry with me.”

“Wedding rings,” John repeats, baffled. “Why?”

Sherlock raises his eyes to look at Mary. “You didn’t want them; you left them here the day you and John took them off.” He turns his head and looks at John. “You didn’t know what to do with them; you contemplated selling them, to get rid of the bad memories, but that made you feel guilty, while a part of you wanted to keep them. I wanted to—to give you a reminder of something good that joins you now, and that has roots in your marriage, even if you’re no longer in that relationship.”

John’s throat hurts. 

Mary snorts a wet laugh. “Why the fuck’d we be angry with you,” she says.

Sherlock narrows his eyes at her. “Well, technically, I stole your property and destroyed it.”

John coughs. “Sherlock,” he says. “Come here, will you?”

Sherlock doesn’t move; he tilts his head inquisitively. “You don’t want to punch me,” he says. “What is it, then?”

“You’re an idiot.” John makes it around the table in three long strides and reaches for him. “I said _come here_.” It’s somehow more nerve-wrecking to hug Sherlock in their kitchen than it was before all the guests at the wedding, but John manages it. At least this time Sherlock hugs him back, if a little hesitantly. John holds him tighter and tries to ignore the way it makes his pulse frantic and his breaths deeper.

“Do you like it?” Sherlock asks in a small voice.

“It’s perfect.” Sherlock’s neck artery is fluttering on his cheek, and John feels a flush creeping up his own neck. “Thank you.” 

“Agreed,” Mary says, and John relinquishes his hold on Sherlock so she can hug him as well.

After that, it’s easier to hunt down a pen and sign his name on all the papers where the little black line’s waiting for John’s signature right next to Mary’s. Mila’s commanding screeching sounds over the baby monitor just as he’s signing the last paper. 

With a broad smile, Mary gets up. “My darling,” she coos. “Stronger lungs every day.”

She disappears upstairs, and John puts the pen down and takes a deep breath. 

“Well, that’s done, then,” he says.

Wordlessly, Sherlock sits down across from him and pours him a fresh glass. He slides it over the table.

“Cheers,” John mutters, raising it to his lips.

Sherlock smiles at him, still silent. It’s a slow, steady glow of a smile, one that makes John’s flush from before flare into life. It feels almost like Sherlock’s arms wrapping around him again, and John suddenly understands what it means when somebody’s to die for. He’s put his life on the line a thousand times for Sherlock’s sake, but this is different. He wants to wrap his limbs and his life around Sherlock, sink his nails into Sherlock’s skin, and live the rest of his days holding on to him and not letting go, even under pain of death. 

***

December turns out dreary and dark, murky with fogs and cold enough to make even Londoners grumpy. John doesn’t mind, though. He walks the streets with Sherlock at his side, with Mila snug in her carrier against his chest, and for the first time in years, the prospect of Christmas glowing in the multiple fairy-lights and fake pine boughs wrapped around the shops’ display windows, is as exciting to him as it was when he was a kid. The shadow of the last December at his back makes it easy to be grateful for what the year’s brought him so far, even if his life now is hardly what he once imagined it to be. 

It’s a Saturday like any other, they don’t have a case on, and John rounds the last corner before home on his way back from Tesco, a bag of groceries in each hand. Mila’s dozing in her carrier, her face barely visible under an enormous red-and-black knitted hat Mrs Hudson’s made for her. John smiles down at her, then lifts his head.

Mary and Sherlock are standing about forty feet down the street, putting the doors of 221b right in the middle between themselves and John. They’re too far away for John to hear what they’re saying over the noise of traffic and other passengers, but he can see Mary laugh, apparently in answer to something Sherlock says, and Sherlock’s own crooked smile. He holds his arms out to her. Mary hugs him, and he bows his head to kiss the top of her head. They let go of each other, and Mary turns the other way and walks briskly down the street, disappearing around the first corner, while Sherlock watches her go with a faint smile.

Then he turns, and immediately spots John, who smiles wryly and starts walking again. They meet before the door.

“Hey,” John says. “How come Mary was here? She told me yesterday she was busy today. That job interview she’s got? On a bloody Saturday, too.”

Sherlock shrugs, still smiling. “Private company, I expect. We went to that teahouse off Cavendish Square with the kleptomaniac owner. Mary wanted cupcakes.”

“Cupcakes,” John repeats flatly. 

Sherlock wrinkles his forehead. “Chocolate ones, yes. With blueberries.”

John raises his eyebrows. “Right,” he says. “Well, I’m freezing, let’s go inside.”

Later, when they’re warm and cozy in front of the living room fire with mugs of tea and Mila’s sleeping upstairs, Sherlock abruptly narrows his eyes at John.

“It bothers you.”

John doesn’t look up from his book. “What does?”

“Mary and me socializing without you present.” 

That does make him look up. “What? No, Sherlock, that’s not it.”

Sherlock sets down his mug and clasps his hands underneath his chin. “Isn’t it?”

The sharpness of his voice makes John falter. True enough, he did feel something akin to jealousy earlier, but it was just a weak pang if it. He spends enough time with Sherlock and with Mary respectively, enough not to be jealous of the two of them spending time together without him. “No,” he repeats. “It’s just ... a bit weird, you know? You going out for tea and cupcakes with Mary and enjoying it. It’s so _normal_.”

Sherlock sniffs haughtily, but stops glaring. “She’s _interesting_ ,” he says.

John snorts. “Yeah, you can say that again.”

Sherlock sticks his nose into his mug. “She sends her love,” he mumbles. 

John smiles. “Thanks.”

A few minutes pass; Sherlock’s apparently researching something on his phone, too lazy to get his laptop from the coffee table, and John’s trying to read and failing miserably. 

“Yeah, sorry, can I just—” He slaps the book shut. “Can I just ask you something?”

Sherlock drops the phone with a sigh. “You just did.”

“Seriously, Sherlock? That’s unoriginal, especially for you.” John runs a hand through his hair, frustrated. “You hated all my girlfriends. All of them. I couldn’t hold on to a woman to save my life because of you.”

“I didn’t _hate_ them,” Sherlock snipes. 

“Semantics. Anyway, not my point - why do you like Mary so much? I _married_ her. You should detest her by all rights.”

Sherlock tilts his head. “She’s smart,” he offers. “And she likes _me_ , which is something none of the others could manage.”

John opens his mouth.

“And you loved her,” Sherlock adds. “That was enough to motivate me.”

John swallows and looks down. “Thanks,” he says. “But. What about—she _shot_ you.”

Sherlock raises his eyebrows. “I remember,” he drawls. “Your point being?”

John gestures helplessly. “ _My point_ being it took me months to come to terms with that, and she was _my wife_. Why aren’t you angry with her?”

Sherlock doesn’t answer immediately. He seems to turn a bit pale, and he looks away from John, into the fire. “It was a love letter to you,” he says at last. “It’d be hard for me to begrudge her that.”

“What?” John shakes his head. “Sherlock, that’s insane.”

It’s like he’s crossed an invisible line he didn’t even know existed, and the only sign of it is Sherlock’s face abruptly shutting off like a candle being blown out. John clenches his teeth and feels the chill run up his spine. He’s no idea what just happened, because even at their worst, Sherlock’s never looked at him like that.

“I’m insane, then.” Sherlock stands up. 

“Sherlock, wait—”

Sherlock walks out of the living room. “Goodnight, John.” 

There’s a quiet clink of a mug being put on the kitchen table, and then the sound of Sherlock’s bedroom door closing. 

If Mila wasn’t asleep, that door would’ve been slammed shut. Baffled, John stares at Sherlock’s empty chair. Briefly, he contemplates going to knock on Sherlock’s door and try to smooth things out - whatever it is that needs smoothing out - but he knows Sherlock, and the man’s never been particularly inclined to listen while in a mood. 

***

John hopes that whatever’s going on will calm down by morning, but Sherlock’s door remains stubbornly shut all through breakfast. After he’s given Mila her bottle and swallowed some food himself, he makes a plate for Sherlock - toast with plenty of butter and honey, Sherlock’s only comfort food - and makes his way down the corridor.

He knocks on the door a few times, then listens. There’s not a sound to be heard from inside, and it suddenly occurs to John that Sherlock might’ve left the flat before John even got up. He presses on the knob. No such luck; the door is locked. 

John sighs. “Sherlock, I’m sorry,” he tells the door. “I don’t know why you’re so upset, but I’m sorry anyway. Come out so I can apologize to you properly.”

Silence.

“Okay.” John crouches down and sets the plate on the floor. “I made breakfast,” he says. “I’ll leave a plate by the door. You don’t have to talk to me, just ... eat something. Please.”

Predictably enough, the plate remains put through the rest of the morning, the toast growing cold and the melted butter hardening into an unappetizing white crust under the pale golden honey. Not even remotely in the mood to actually cook, John orders takeaway for lunch and exchanges the breakfast plate for a plate of steaming chicken curry. When he tries to talk to Sherlock, he gets the same answer as in the morning.

The curry goes cold. By four, when Mary comes to pick Mila up, Sherlock’s continued silent absence tips from sulky into worrying. When Mary asks about him, John grimaces.

“He’s in his room, he won’t come out. I’ve upset him, I don’t even know how.”

Mary gives him a sharp look. “Oh, you know,” she says. “Just think. He’s hardly easy to insult.”

“Easier than you think,” John mutters.

“He’s literally never angry with you, John.” Mary eases Mila into her carrier and picks up her bag. “Have you talked to him yet?” she asks, voice lowered. 

John sighs. “You know I haven’t.”

“Well, now it’d be a good time. It’s almost Christmas, anyway.” Mary flashes him a smile and marches to the door. “Give the man his gift,” she adds, when they reach the bottom of the stairs.

“Mary—”

“What’re you afraid of?” she interrupts him, whirling around and making Mila squeak happily. “What, John? In the very unlikely case that he really doesn’t think about you that way, do you think he’d actually kick you out? Or that he wouldn’t want to be your friend anymore, after everything that’s happened? Would you really prefer to make you both suffer for god knows how long? Fuck, aren’t you curious at all?”

John snaps his mouth shut. “Yeah, alright,” he mutters.

Mary rises her eyebrows. “Alright?”

“Yeah, alright, I’ll talk to him.” John rubs at his forehead. “See you Wednesday?”

“Actually, can you watch Mila Tuesday afternoon? The interview went well yesterday, but they have some more questions. Very detailed requirements.” Mary grins. “It’s just shipment management, but it sounds complicated enough.”

“Yeah, sure.” John smiles back. “Congratulations are in order, then?”

“Not yet. I’ll see you, okay?” She nudges her chin at Mila’s hair. “Say bye, sweetheart.”

John bends and kisses Mila’s cheeks. “Have fun, darling.”

“We will.” Mary squeezes his shoulder. “Go talk to His Nibs, hey?”

John nods. “Take care.”

When the door closes behind them, there’s a distinctive sound of running water from upstairs. John curses and bolts up the stairs.

He opens the kitchen door just in time to catch Sherlock halfway between the loo and the bedroom. “Wait,” he exclaims, and Sherlock whips around.

He’s deathly pale, his eyes bruised with the lack of sleep. He’s holding his wrinkled dressing gown closed tightly with his arms crossed over his chest, curled in on himself. The worst is the stare that arches over the space between them and punches John in the chest: vulnerable and raw and furious.

John instinctively wants to take a step back, but steps forward instead. He’s seen Sherlock sulking countless times, and this isn’t it. This is pain; enough of it to remind John of that cold January morning at the airport.

“Sherlock, I’m sorry.” It comes out far too unsteady for his liking. John takes another step closer. “Please, I don’t know what else to say.” 

Sherlock gives a flat shrug, then turns and walks back down the corridor.

Something snaps in John’s chest. “For fuck’s sake, Sherlock, bloody _talk to me!_ ”

Sherlock steps over the plate of curry, and the door closes behind him, the lock giving a soft snick when it slides into place. 

***

In the morning, John comes down the stairs to the smell of fresh coffee. Momentarily, he’s relieved - at least Sherlock’s up and about. 

Then, he walks through the kitchen door and sees him sitting at the table, still with the glare from last night, buttoned up into a crisp suit like he never is this early. 

“Morning,” John says, warily. 

Sherlock soundlessly sets down his coffee mug. “Sit down,” he says flatly. 

“Yeah, I know, we have to talk.” John hunts down a fresh mug and pours himself some coffee. “I really am sorry, you know. I’ve been thinking and—”

“Not about that.”

John frowns and sits down. “What’s more important than this? You’re obviously still upset and I—”

“We need to talk about when you’re going to move out,” Sherlock interrupts him smoothly. “It really can’t be put off any longer, I see.”

It makes John gape at him stupidly for a few seconds. “What? Sherlock, come on. We had a bloody fight, it happens.”

“Not my point.” Sherlock’s face doesn’t even twitch. “Just answer me.”

John hangs his head. He did move in again, supposedly just for a few days and with an infant daughter in tow, without ever explicitly asking Sherlock if it was alright with him. “I thought you were okay with me living here again,” he mutters. “I know I didn’t precisely ask, and I’m sorry. It must’ve been a fuss for you, with Mila around and everything.”

“Don’t put words in my mouth.” Sherlock’s gaze is cold and still inexplicably furious. John’s no stranger to this kind of treatment, but Sherlock’s never directed it at him before, and suddenly he understands why it makes half of Lestrade’s team shrink in on themselves and start stuttering; he has to fight to not look away from Sherlock. “I didn’t say I want you to move out. That’s the last thing I want. We’re not discussing my wishes, John, so let me repeat my question: when are you planning on moving out?”

John shakes his head. “You’re not making any sense. I don’t even want to move out, why the hell’d you think I do?”

The smooth mask finally cracks and Sherlock’s eyes flash. “Don’t lie to me,” he snaps. “You’ve always been looking for girlfriends, always so eager to move on to that ordinary life you think you should want. Whenever you’re with me, it’s temporary.”

John stares at him, disbelief and sudden anger sucking the air out of his chest. “I can’t believe you,” he rasps. “You actually have the nerve to accuse me of _leaving_ you? For trying to make a life for myself?”

Sherlock gets up so fast his chair falls over. “What else’d you call this?” he hisses. “Moving out to get married, then coming back because you thought I needed looking after? Then you left again, and now you’re here, and you’d like me to believe that me and this flat aren’t something you consider only when you don’t know what else to do?”

“You left first,” John whispers. “Don’t you fucking _dare_ put this on me alone—”

Sherlock’s face twists violently. “ _I came back_ ,” he growls, marching around the table toward John, who instinctively gets up, convinced that he’s going to get punched. “I came back, I was _here_ , and you, _you_ never came back except when you needed a bed and a break from your miserable suburban life.”

“I had a wife!” John yells. “If you wouldn’t get it into your head that I was still the same person, that you were still my best friend—what’d you have me do? Drop everything and come running to you, like you hadn’t made me mourn you for two bloody years, Sherlock—”

“No,” Sherlock hisses venomously enough that John takes a step back. “No, of course not. Why on earth would you?” He advances, and John’s back hits the kitchen cupboards. “Why would you? Since I’m insane, and you are, as you never forget to mention, _not gay_.” 

The last two words are sneered into John’s face with that same raw pain he saw in Sherlock’s look yesterday. It’s similar enough to an actual punch in the stomach that it leaves John gasping like a fish. It’s hard to believe what he’s just heard, but it really doesn’t leave much room for interpretation.

Whatever Sherlock sees in his face, it makes him pull back fast. He strides out of the kitchen door and grabs his coat.

“Wait,” John gets out, but Sherlock’s steps are already crashing down the stairs. A moment later, the street door bangs shut hard enough that the entire old building trembles faintly.

John grabs the edge of the counter and closes his eyes. _I told you so_ , Mary’s voice whispers in his head.

***

John may not be a genius, but he knows Sherlock. Once he manages to collect himself enough to put on his shoes and his jacket and go down to the street himself, there’s no sign of the man in any direction, but that’s to be expected. John thinks it over carefully, then makes a minor bet and starts walking. 

Fifteen minutes later, he arrives at Cavendish Square. It’s an icy, cloudy morning, and the benches under the bare trees are all empty, except one. Sherlock’s sharp silhouette is black against the pale brown and grey background.

Sherlock’s smoking, and doesn’t turn to look at him, not even when John sits down on the bench next to him. He coughs, not really knowing how to start, so he just watches Sherlock for a few seconds: lips pressed together tightly, curls on the forehead twitching faintly in time with his heartbeat, bloodless fingers trembling around his cigarette.

“I’d appreciate it if you didn’t drag it out,” Sherlock says woodenly. “I can take it, I assure you.”

John frowns. “Didn’t drag out what?”

“The speech you prepared.” Sherlock lets out a shaky exhale, foggy with smoke and his own warmth. “About how you’re touched, and very fond of me as well, but you just don’t think about me like that. We shall remain friends, nothing needs to change, and so on.”

John purses his lips. True enough, he has a speech ready, but in the face of Sherlock’s silent resignation, not dragging it out does seem the best possible option.

“When you asked me why Mary and me got a divorce, I lied.” John licks his lips. “Or rather, I didn’t tell you the entire truth. So I’m telling you now, alright?”

Sherlock sighs. “If you must.”

John takes a deep breath. He straightens his shoulders and looks at the hole in his world. It’s really high time he names it. “Mary said I loved you more than I loved her. That nobody makes me feel as much as you do. I didn’t have much to say to that.”

There’s traffic, and a flock of cooing pigeons scattered around the benches. Still, it’s quiet enough that John hears it when Sherlock stops breathing. 

“Listen to me.” John nudges Sherlock’s shoulder with his. “I love you. Okay? Not going to say ‘like a friend’, promise. Well, that too, but. Just—I love you. That’s all.”

The half-smoked cigarette tumbles to the ground. Sherlock breathes in again, sharp, and turns his head at last. There’s nothing but white shocked silence in his eyes.

“And,” John continues, emboldened, “I’m still not gay, but we’ll work something out. After all, you’re _you_. One of a kind, you are.”

Sherlock blinks. Parts his lips, but nothing comes out.

“Now, let’s see if we can manage this if we aren’t handcuffed together.” John rests his left hand on Sherlock’s right knee, with his palm facing up. And waits. Keeps looking at Sherlock.

Sherlock’s fingers really are as cold as they look, but his hand’s large and he grips John’s with slightly desperate strength. “I forgot my gloves,” Sherlock mutters. The silence’s melting from his face, and a smile begins to tug at his mouth.

Helplessly, John smiles back. It’s like flinging the curtains open after a long black night and blinking into the blinding morning sun. “Good thing I found you quick, then.”

“Yes.”

“I’m sorry,” John blurts out. “For taking so long to figure all this out. I should’ve told you sooner.”

The smile widens a bit, unsteady. “I could say the same to you.” 

John squeezes his hand. “It’s okay,” he says. “I was afraid, too.”

He thinks Sherlock’ll protest, saying that fear is irrational or some such bollocks, but he’s quiet. They sit in silence for a few minutes, and Sherlock’s fingers slowly grow warmer.

Then Sherlock heaves in a shuddering breath. “What now?”

John glances at the sky. “Now we’re going home,” he says. He gets up, not letting go of Sherlock’s hand. “I know we’re in London, but I could swear it’s about to start snowing.” He tugs on his hand, and Sherlock stands up.

“That’s not what I meant, John.”

John tucks their entwined hands into Sherlock’s coat pocket. “We’re going home,” he repeats, “and then I’m going to kiss you.”

***

They walk in silence. Sherlock’s pocket’s too high for John to be comfortable with his hand in it, but the twinge in his wrist seems insignificant with Sherlock’s fingers wrapped around his. The streets are empty - empty for London, that is - and with a start, John remembers that’s still a Monday, still a morning, that everybody’s at work and in school, and that he himself has a shift this afternoon. Sherlock’s holding his hand, and John’s going to kiss him when they get home, and the world hasn’t gone up in flames. The knowledge makes him a bit lightheaded; it’s exhilarating and terrifying at the same time. He _has_ just done that, finally. Also, he has just done _that_. 

When the door of 221 closes behind them, John’s forced to wiggle his hand out of Sherlock’s; the staircase’s too narrow, and his keys are in his left pocket. Sherlock gestures him forward, and he goes, hearing Sherlock’s quiet footsteps in the spaces between his own.

John lets them in, then turns to hang his jacket next to the door and toe his shoes off. “I’ll put the kettle on, shall I?” he asks, feeling hideously awkward all of a sudden. “I know you love your coffee, but I’m gasping.”

The answer is quiet, but fast. “Not now, John.”

John turns his head. Sherlock’s standing there, stock still, looking at him, not even moving to take off his things. His eyes are very wide.

“Oh,” John says, and hears Sherlock swallow thickly.

“You said. When—when we get home. You said you would.” A pause, another swallow. “We’re home now.”

In any other circumstances, hearing Sherlock point out something obvious like this’d make John laugh. “Yeah. I—yes. We are.” 

He steps forward. Sherlock takes a step back.

John stops. “You okay?” He doesn’t look it; too pale, eyes too bright.

“Yes, of course.” Sherlock grips the edges of his coat. “I’m perfectly fine.”

“Fine,” John echoes. He takes two quick steps forward, and Sherlock mirrors him again. 

He wobbles slightly when his calves hit the side of the coffee table. He closes his eyes for a long moment, embarrassed annoyance flitting across his face, and John feels his mouth twitch. 

“Sofa’s on your left,” he says.

He steps forward again, and Sherlock steps to the side, and then sits down hard, and John follows him; one knee up on the seat, then another, and then he’s in Sherlock’s lap and not thinking about it.

He squeezes Sherlock’s shoulders, feels the unsteady tremor threaded through him. Sherlock lifts his chin, and the pale winter light seeping through the windows sparks in his eyes. “Are _you_ alright, John?”

John swallows. True enough, he suddenly can’t remember how he’d kissed anybody for the first time, ever. He must’ve just—done it. It seems impossible now. Just—putting his hands on Sherlock, just like that, especially when he’s still wearing his scarf and his coat, all wrapped up for the outside world. Like an invasion.

His scarf. John takes a deep breath and reaches for its knot, finds it warmed from body heat. He loosens it slowly. The wool sliding against itself sounds like skin caressing skin. He pulls it away, and drops it on the sofa next to them. Sherlock watches him silently. He’s wearing a black shirt, and the contrast of all that dark against his pale neck and face makes John’s stomach clench. He brushes his fingers along the edge of the coat’s raised collar. He turns it down, smooths it away from Sherlock’s neck. 

It’s easier, now that he’s touched something of Sherlock’s in a way that he never has before, so he slides his hand back along Sherlock’s shoulder and up his neck, feeling Sherlock twitch a bit at the contact. He moves his hand higher, smooths his thumb over the smooth, sharp jawline. Freshly shaven and folded into his armour to have an argument with John - now here for John to unfold. Sherlock tilts his head back slightly. John holds his breath and runs his thumb over Sherlock’s lips, watches dark eyelashes flutter and feels Sherlock’s breathing deepen. His lips soften under John’s touch, part slightly. They’re smooth and very dry. 

John exhales in a rush. He’s standing right before the hole in his world, the edges of it are _right there_ , and the ground is swaying under his feet. He’s sinking. He’s going to fall. Even if he jumps, he’s still going to fall. Sherlock slowly lifts his hand and slips his fingers under John’s sleeve, wraps them around his wrist. Holds him in. He’s watching John; waiting with his eyes wide open. John breathes shakily, feels that look burn in his chest, press against his heart. He caresses Sherlock’s mouth again, and his lips part a bit more. He imagines Sherlock panting, Sherlock shaking all over, Sherlock coming from John’s hands, always watching him just like this. Sherlock’s breath returns the touch, hot and unsteady against John’s skin. 

“You said you would,” Sherlock breathes, kisses the words against John’s skin. 

The edges of the hole tremble, crumble in on themselves. John closes his eyes, because he can, because Sherlock’s watching him, and he knows where he’s going. The ground sinks into nothing from under his feet, and John falls. He comes out of it on the other side with Sherlock’s lips under his lips, Sherlock’s hands splayed over his back, and Sherlock’s startled moan vibrating in his mouth. 

He tastes like panic: smoke-bitter, coffee-sour, and with the slight tang of an empty stomach. His mouth’s trembling along with the rest of him. John tries to breathe through his own shock, gets his hands into Sherlock’s hair and his fingertips drag across Sherlock’s scalp, and Sherlock makes a faint, breathless sound that scrapes up John’s back like ten perfect claws. His heart’s swelling in his throat, like it’s trying to crawl into Sherlock’s mouth. Sherlock’s hands are scrabbling across his back, trying to grab something, arms tightening around John. _Sherlock’s hands. Sherlock’s mouth_. John clutches him closer. It’s like an endless inhale, an impossibly brilliant moment stretched out in time to the point of breaking. 

It’s the impossible, and it’s happening. John tears his mouth away with a gasp. Blindly, he kisses across Sherlock’s burning face; cheek, nose, tickle of eyelashes on his lips, and then his nose’s in Sherlock’s hair and he’s breathing in and in and _in_ , and Sherlock’s mouth’s wet and open against his neck and John exhales with a rasp.

“Oh, God, I missed you so much,” he mumbles into his hair. Wraps his arms around Sherlock’s shoulders and holds him close. 

“John,” Sherlock says, pleads. “John—”

“Yes.” He pulls on Sherlock’s hair and bends back down to his mouth. “Missed you so much,” he repeats against his lips, drunk on closeness. “Here you are.” 

It’s slower now, and every detail burns with devastating clarity. Tiny rasps of sound on the end of Sherlock’s exhales. That seamless border between the smoothness of his lips and the slick hot inside of his mouth. Long bony fingers, now on his cheeks: one hand cold, and the other warm. John’s hands in his hair making him tip his head further back and a deep purring sound vibrating in his chest. John slowly, gently sinks his teeth into his lower lip and Sherlock’s breath stutters and stumbles and then punches out of him in unsteady pants. 

The kisses are exhaled, slowing down into little shivery brushes of lips against lips. One more. Then one more. John rests his forehead against Sherlock’s and breathes. Releases Sherlock’s hair and brings his fingers around to his face. It seems logical, somehow, to ran the pad of his thumb over Sherlock’s lips again, so he does, and finds them wet and flushed-hot. His own doing. The thought is feverishly bright behind his closed eyelids.

He raises his head and opens his eyes. Sherlock looks back at him with a blinding, steady, triumphant glow that John’s never seen on him before. Gently, he takes John’s hand, presses a kiss into his palm, and moves it back to where it was, pressed against his cheek. 

For a long moment, John can only stare at him, and then he wraps his arms around Sherlock’s shoulders and hauls him close. Sherlock’s head fits achingly well under John’s chin, and John sinks a hand into his hair and feels Sherlock’s breath on his neck.

There might be words, but John doesn’t have them.

***

For the second day in a row, John makes toast with butter and honey - four slices this time, enough for both of them. He’s still standing by the counter, licking honey from the knife and flexing his aching knees, when Sherlock joins him in the kitchen. Wordlessly, he puts the kettle on and then folds himself into a kitchen chair, wrapping the dressing gown tightly around himself.

John puts their plates on the table and Sherlock starts eating without a word of protest. 

Even if he’s starving, John falters after he’s demolished his first slice. He licks the honey and crumbs off his fingers and lifts his head.

“About Saturday evening,” he starts hesitantly, and Sherlock glances up at him.

“I’m not angry anymore,” he says calmly.

John shakes his head. “Doesn’t matter. I want to apologize properly. And explain, I suppose.”

Sherlock sighs gently and swipes the tip of his finger across the honey on his remaining piece of breakfast. “It really isn’t necessary, John. I overreacted, I admit.” Absently, he licks his finger clean.

“No, you didn’t.” John exhales and hangs his head. “You thought I was saying that—that sentiment is insane, right? This wasn’t what I meant at all, but I get how it sounded to you.”

“John—”

“I was just—” John squeezes his eyes shut for a moment, opens them again. “I just got you back, yeah?” He gestures aimlessly, and Sherlock drops his toast and leans towards him over the table. “No, listen, _please_. I just got you back, and then you almost died again, and then you almost left me— _again_ , right, and you can’t suggest to me that you take your own life so lightly, not—not after all that’s happened. Okay?”

Sherlock’s jaw works. “It seems we both misunderstood each other,” he says quietly and looks down at his plate. “I don’t see my life as meaningless. For your sake, if nothing else.”

John gives a brittle laugh. “That’s not better, Sherlock. Not better at all.”

“I’m simply telling you the truth. You did ask.” Sherlock looks at him. “I meant to say that while Mary’s actions were stupid, and could’ve been avoided, I have done worse to myself, and by extension you, in order to protect you, and by extension myself. I have no moral ground to stand on and look down on her. I understand her too precisely.”

John mulls it over. “Alright,” he says at last, and the tiniest smile creeps up on Sherlock’s face. “I can live with that, I guess.”

Sherlock shrugs slightly. “It’s what I have to offer you.”

That, and the rest of himself. John opens his mouth, but the words cling to his throat with tiny stinging claws. He’d thought it’d be easier now, but no such luck. He takes a few long sips of tea in hope it’ll knock something loose in him. As if sentiment were a physical thing. Maybe it is. John feels Sherlock’s lips against his, feels his shocked bright eyes in the park, feels it banging around inside his chest with senseless longing, as if the last hour’d happened months and months ago. 

Across the table, Sherlock abruptly shoves his half-full plate away and leans back in his chair, fingers drumming on the table. “What’re we doing, John?”

John looks up. “What?” Sherlock’s eyes are too wide, and John’s heart plummets. “You’re having second thoughts.”

Sherlock shakes his head violently. “No. But you will.”

John clenches his fists on the table. “Have you even _listened_ to me - in the park? And just now?”

“Perhaps not now. But in six months, or a year, or five years - John.” Sherlock abruptly leans across the table, extending his arms toward him. His hands curl into fists just beside John’s. “What happens when this doesn’t work?”

John breathes, carefully, in and out. “It doesn’t matter.” He unclenches his hands. When Sherlock doesn’t move away from a brush of his fingers, John wraps his hand around Sherlock’s wrist. “I’m not leaving this address again, Sherlock. I was trying to tell you, earlier. Let’s say—let’s say it doesn’t work out. We’d just go back to sleeping in our separate rooms. If it doesn’t work, it—it changes _nothing_. I thought you were dead and it didn’t change anything.”

“To my knowledge, romantic relationships aren’t supposed to work like that.” Sherlock’s eyes rapidly search his face, but he looks marginally calmer, and John squeezes his wrist.

“It’s you and me, Sherlock. What’d you expect?”

It startles a bark of laughter out of Sherlock, and with a smile, John lets go and stuffs half of his cooling toast slice in his mouth at once. He glances towards the clock.

“You’re working today.”

“Brilliant deduction,” John mumbles and chews.

“Don’t.” Sherlock leans back and picks up his own toast. 

John swallows. “Don’t what?”

“Go to work.” Sherlock takes the tiniest possible bite and chews delicately.

John is torn between rolling his eyes at Sherlock’s silent mocking of his table manners and being oddly touched. “Nice try,” he sighs. “I can’t. They’re already doing me too many favours with the schedule. I need to stay on top of it, not spend my days off when I don’t really need them.”

“Fine.” Sherlock pointedly looks away. 

John looks at the clock again and hurriedly stuffs the rest of his toast into his mouth and swallows. “I don’t have to leave for an hour, though,” he says.

“Go solve the _crossword_ , then,” Sherlock sneers at the kitchen cupboards, and John clears his throat. 

“Actually, we could go back to the sofa for a bit.”

Sherlock’s eyes snap back to him. He seems to have forgotten to be annoyed with John, if the bright flush creeping up his throat is anything to go by.

John coughs again and tries to pretend he’s not blushing himself. “Or I could go solve that crossword,” he offers lamely.

“No, I—no.” Sherlock scrambles to his feet. “Now?”

It was meant to be an order, John knows, but it sounds heartbreakingly like a plea. He beams up at Sherlock. “Yeah, now.”

***

When John walks out of the clinic, the daylight’s long gone, and it’s even colder than it was in the morning. He stops outside the doors and roots through his pockets for his gloves. 

He zips his jacket up to his chin and turns to the left, the direction of the nearest Tube station, and stops.

Just a few feet away, Sherlock’s standing in the cloud of yellow light cast by the nearest streetlamp. Wrapped up in his coat, he looks tall and untouchable like a shadow that falls over his face. Still, John’d recognize that silhouette everywhere. He stuffs his hands into his pockets and steps closer, hesitant again. A few hours ago, he’d kissed Sherlock - _god_ , and kissed him, and kissed him, kissed Sherlock’s neck and mouth and ears and fingertips until he was glowing with the feel of it, and then he had to leave for work, and he’d left Sherlock stretched out on the sofa - Sherlock with his hair mussed into a soft thundercloud by John’s hands and his eyes slipping shut and his swollen mouth that pursed unhappily when John left. Time stretches out over John’s dull afternoon, and again, it seems like it all happened months ago. 

Sherlock moves, lifts his chin, and the light slips over his face. He smiles slowly; a shy brightness, as if he isn’t certain if John’s going to be happy to see him here or not.

John’s feet move him forward, and Sherlock’s smile solidifies. “Evening,” he says. 

Helplessly, John smiles back. “Hi,” he says. “Everything alright?”

Sherlock frowns slightly. “Yes, of course. Why wouldn’t it be?”

John shrugs. “You don’t come here unless it’s to drag me to a case, and even then you’re never so polite to just wait outside.”

Sherlock bites his lip and glances aside. “We don’t have anything for dinner at home,” he says. “Angelo’s?”

They often don’t have anything for dinner at home, barring tea and Mila’s formula. Sherlock usually texts him to get takeaway or go do the shopping, or he forgets entirely and then John has to crawl downstairs to Mrs Hudson and sheepishly ask her for some bread and a tin of beans. John swallows thickly. He went to the shops on Saturday, and he knows for a fact that the fridge is full of food. They aren’t even out of milk. 

John clears his throat. “You don’t have to do that,” he says. “Just—just ask me, and I can say yes.”

Sherlock’s cold-flushed cheeks get a touch brighter. “Alright,” he says, shifts his weight. “Let’s go, I’m hungry.”

“Sure.” John steps closer. “Would you like anything else?”

Sherlock bites his lip again. “Promise me,” he blurts out.

John frowns. “Promise you what?”

“Promise you won’t change your mind about me.” Sherlock steps closer and John freezes under his searching, restless gaze. “I know that—there are outside influences, there always are. Factors you—we can’t control. I’m not stupid, John, but for God’s sake, what you can—just promise me you won’t change your mind.”

John draws in a hitching breath. “Yeah,” he says. Clears his throat again. “Okay. Promise.”

Sherlock blinks, and then he laughs - a trembling, short burst of brilliant happiness that stabs through John’s chest, and then John kisses him, pulls him down and holds his head still with gloved hands and seals his words under Sherlock’s skin.

He pulls back and a snowflake lands on Sherlock’s nose. John giggles breathlessly.

“Oh, my god. Look.” He gently wipes it off Sherlock’s nose and shows him the wet smear. 

Sherlock blinks some more, looks at John’s finger and then back to John, and his face stretches into a smile. “In bloody London, too.”

True enough, thick specks are gently swirling around them, white against the dark street and then golden under the light of the lamp. John looks up into the sky and catches a few with his tongue. The cold, bluish taste is like pinpricks against Sherlock’s warmth, tea and toast and—smoke, the bastard’s been smoking again later in the day, apparently. 

Sherlock snorts quietly. “Ridiculous.”

“Leave it. It’s _snow_.” John grins up at him. “Sherlock.”

An inquisitive hum, and Sherlock places his cold, gloveless hand on John’s cheek.

John covers it with his own. “Take me to dinner, I’m starving.”

***

(“I’m going to bed,” John said, and Sherlock grabbed his hand and pulled him back down on the sofa. 

“No, you’re not.”)

So here they are; Sherlock politely confined to one half of his bed, somehow disappointingly proper in his pajamas, and John carefully sits down on the edge of the mattress. He did put on his own pajamas, and a dressing gown over them, and bizarrely, he feels exposed when Sherlock rolls his head around and looks at him with raised eyebrows.

“Something wrong?”

“Nope.” John swallows. He’s about to get into bed with a man. Not a man, Sherlock. It seems like an occasion that requires cracking open some champagne and shouting it from the rooftops. Even if Sherlock himself is acting as if this were something he did every single day of his life.

Sherlock also has long white feet that twitch when he’s impatient. They’re twitching right now, his toes grasping at the sheets. “Get in, then.”

They haven’t mentioned sex at all. John stands up and takes his dressing gown off. Behind him, Sherlock’s getting under the covers. No need to be getting ahead of himself, then. It’s not like they’ve made any plans. He goes to hang it up on the door and clicks the light off, then slowly gets under the covers himself.

Sherlock looks at him through the bluish dark, and his eyes glint weakly in a stray strand of the orange streetlight. Then he clicks his night lamp on.

John swallows again. “Point taken,” he murmurs. 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Sherlock answers promptly. 

John snorts. “Sure you don’t.”

“Sure I don’t.” Sherlock rolls towards him and ostentatiously makes himself comfortable on his side. “We’ve established multiple times now that I don’t know enough about how people are supposed to behave. You, on the other hand, are more than proficient in that area.”

John blinks at him. “Yes?” he agrees warily.

“Well, then.” Sherlock nods decisively. “You should kiss me goodnight, right?”

John has to smile. “I should,” he agrees. “Would you like me to?” It’s only slightly rude to ask, since the answer is obvious, especially after all the kissing throughout the day, but there’s something in him that still wants it. Wants to hear it, loud and clear.

Sherlock narrows his eyes. “Come here,” he says, voice wavering slightly, “and kiss me.”

All that John manages to do on his own is scoot closer, and then Sherlock grabs him and pulls him all the way in. 

Mary had asked John that horrible day - hell, it seems like it was years ago - if he didn’t want to hold Sherlock close; if he really didn’t want to kiss him. At the time, John thought that was hardly relevant - Sherlock wouldn’t want him to, in any case, so it didn’t matter if John wanted it. 

Miraculously, Sherlock _does_ want—Sherlock is clinging to him like he’s still afraid that John’s going to suddenly change his mind and leave, and John wraps his arms tighter around him in response, tilts his head and lets Sherlock just—rub their lips together, gently, back and forth, little maddening strokes of his beautiful soft mouth, and then he suddenly bites down on John’s lower lip, sucks it into his mouth with a broken, almost panicked noise that makes John feel like he’s about to shake out of his skin with want.

Want to touch, fuck, _everywhere_ , and to just hold close, until the years of unnamed hunger stop eating at him.

Want to just kiss him goodnight. 

John tears his mouth away and Sherlock gasps, “No, what’re you _doing_ ,” and then, “yes, _yes_ , do that,” when John kisses his neck, and just keeps on going, all the way down to the edge of Sherlock’s ratty shirt, entranced by the rosy imprints rising out of the pale skin. The curve of Sherlock’s right collarbone is _right there_ , painfully elegant, and John gives in and bites it. Sherlock sighs, breath hitching, and his fingers dig into John’s back, wrap around the back of John’s head and hold him close.

John pants against his skin, scrapes his teeth over the bone again just to hear that sensation rasp on Sherlock’s exhale. _Kiss me goodnight_.

“Fuck,” John mumbles, shoves the front of Sherlock’s shirt up his chest and presses his mouth to the flush bleeding down from Sherlock’s throat. Every red spot beckons like a magnet. He moves lower and finds a soft patch of dark hairs, and nuzzles his face into it. Another kiss, and Sherlock’s chest heaves wildly.

“John. John—”

John closes his eyes, turns his head and presses his lips against a small, hard nipple. 

Sherlock makes a faint, shocked sound, and his fingers tighten painfully in John’s hair. He likes it so much, all of it, absolutely _loves_ John touching him like this, it’s so blissfuly obvious; hands gripping him, arms clutching him close, that beloved voice starting to crack with pleasure. John realizes he’s sunk his teeth in around Sherlock’s nipple, moaning thoughtlessly, greedy tongue circling and lapping, and Sherlock is trembling underneath him, pressing himself closer and whimpering helplessly.

There is just—so _much_ of him. He’s endless. He’s everywhere, in John’s mouth and wrapped around him. So much of him that should absolutely be kissed, right now. John lets his nipple go, and the sight of it, how red and swollen it is, slices down his spine like a lick of flame. He squeezes his eyes shut and kisses the lovely smooth planes of Sherlock’s ribs, glides his mouth over the ridges, and then he’s kissing the vulnerable veil of skin that descends from the last ribs to the stomach, and Sherlock is gasping like his lungs won’t obey him, and—

 _Kiss me goodnight_.

John exhales against his skin and opens his eyes, wants to look at Sherlock’s face - and there’s the gunshot scar, a neat little pink line from where they took the bullet out. John abruptly feels cold all over, fiercely reminded of just how improbable all this is, how many crossroads of chance could’ve taken it away. His fingers are splayed on Sherlock’s ridiculously pale skin and his tongue’s singing with the taste of Sherlock’s mouth, and really, he’s a prosaic man, but right now, it’s chilling to think that all this is simply the result of a long line of coincidences, of twists that could’ve so easily turned out any other way. 

John slowly lowers his head and places a very gentle kiss on top of the scar. Then he crawls back up and finds Sherlock looking ... well, a bit pissed off, that’s really the only word for it.

“Oh, _please_ , let’s stop to chat about the weather,” he snipes. He throws the covers to the side, manhandles John all the way on top, and wraps his legs around his waist with a pointed glare. 

“Um,” John says intelligently. Sherlock’s warm hands are on his back, under his shirt, greedily sliding up and down, inching the shirt up and the bottoms down, and there’s a slow wave of goosebumps crawling up his body, sniping at his nerves.

Sherlock lifts his eyebrows and slowly, calculatedly arches against him, eyelashes fluttering involuntarily, and John shudders all over.

“You said to kiss you goodnight,” he says, desperate, and Sherlock’s eyes soften.

“Kiss me goodnight some more, then,” he says, and pulls John down with a hand in his hair. He arches again, softly brushing his parted lips against John’s. “And more,” he breathes, and rocks them together once, breath hitching. “A lot more, p—”

John seals their mouths together then, because there’s little else he’s ever wanted to do more than give Sherlock everything he asks for, especially now. He buries his hands in his hair and kisses him and lets himself be wrapped up in greedy limbs and tries not to have a heart attack. That breathy, calculated voice was devastating enough, but when he can’t talk, Sherlock sounds like John’s shoving a knife under his ribs, and that’s just—fuck, _fuck_ , John barely musters up enough sense to lift his head again.

“Do you want—I don’t know what, jesus, Sherlock—”

“I don’t care,” Sherlock gasps, eyes burning, “for god’s sake, John, anything, anywhere, _I don’t care_ , just kiss me and—”

John has no idea how either of them manages to get rid of enough clothing, molded together in a kiss as they are, but then he has Sherlock’s long bare legs locked around his own bare waist, has every hot, eager inch of him pressed tight against himself, and Sherlock wraps his arms around John’s neck, frantically rocking them together. It’s a sharp, rough sensation, and every slide makes John want to scream; instead he digs his fingers deeper into Sherlock’s hair and kisses him. Keeps kissing him. Wonders, dimly, if it’s at all possible to just never stop.

But it doesn’t take long enough, really; Sherlock is vibrating in his grasp, nails biting into the back of John’s neck, and then he wails into John’s mouth and comes all over him, hot and wet, like a kiss given with his entire body. 

His head drops back on the pillow and he pants for air, eyes squeezed shut, mouth red and gaping like a wound. John stares at him, shocked still. Like a particularly bloody crime scene—the immediacy, the obviousness—it never seemed possible. It’s like a dream even now, the colours too vibrant, and _Jesus_ , the scent of him—

Sherlock’s eyelids flutter open. “John,” he rasps, and squirms, and _oh_ , that’s—wet and slick and still twitching, so very alive and so close, and—John’s face is buried into Sherlock’s neck, moaning helplessly, hips jerking forward of their own volition. 

Sherlock drags him up by his hair. “Look at me.” 

“God, fuck, you’re so—” 

“Please look at me, you have to—John,” and John drags his eyes open. 

Sherlock is staring at him, feverish and ravenous. “I want it,” he breathes. “I want it, John, give it to me—” and what’s left of reality splinters along with John’s flesh.

When he comes out of the golden haze of it, he’s lying on his side, with Sherlock’s head tucked under his chin.

“We should probably wash up,” John mumbles. Sherlock’s curls tickle his raw-feeling mouth, and he tightens his arms around Sherlock’s shoulders. It’s unfair, really, that they can’t simply melt together.

“Just a few minutes,” Sherlock murmurs, and he shifts slightly, and presses a soft kiss to the sprawling scar on John’s shoulder.

***

John looks around their living room. At a first glance, one could’ve almost mistaken it for the same Christmas Eve party from five years ago. In truth, even if most of their guests are the same, it might as well be a scene from another life, a life John still isn’t sure is really, finally his.

There’s no Christmas tree - there was one, for a few days, but Mila took care of it pretty quickly, and there was little to be done except take copious photos and laugh. Mary’s stretched out on the floor with her and Greg, and they take turns rolling a ball of crushed wrapping paper to Mila, who squeals happily every time she manages to catch it. Sherlock’s playing carols on his violin by the window, and John catches his eyes smiling from the dark glass; later, he’ll find the bitter scent of rosin on Sherlock’s neck and lick it away, and red indents from strings on the tips of his fingers, and kiss them one by one. Mrs Hudson’s sipping eggnog and chatting to Mycroft, of all people, who is, by John’s expert estimation, on his fourth scotch and getting hilariously red in the face. 

He’d turned up too early, and John took it for merely Mycroft being Mycroft and not wanting to miss an opportunity to piss Sherlock off. But then, Mycroft coughed and shifted his weight and ignored every single of Sherlock’s jibes, and John finally dropped everything in the kitchen, where he’d been helping Mrs Hudson, and stomped into the living room. 

“Alright, that’s it, just say what you want to say,” he snapped, and Sherlock snorted, his mouth full of a filched biscuit.

Mycroft sniffed and drew himself up to his full height. “Congratulations are in order, I see.”

John gaped at him. “Right, of course,” he said faintly. “I’m talking to you, I forgot.”

“Mind your own business,” Sherlock mumbled. “If your nose gets any more exercise, it’ll get bigger than your entire head.”

“That’s childish even for you, Sherlock.” Mycroft shifted his weight again. “Now, if you two could listen to me? Thank you. I wish to inform you that if any one of you ever does something to ...” He waves his hand between John and glowering Sherlock. “To _muck this up_ , as it were, I will personally hunt you down and make you suffer. Because the other one’ll be making _me_ suffer, and I’ve had quite enough second-hand excitement from you two in the last few years, thank you very much.”

Sherlock swallowed and sat up straighter, beginnings of a frown on his face. “I’ll admit I’m not terribly familiar with the traditions of this, but aren’t you supposed to be threatening _John_ with evisceration in the case he ever hurts _me_ in any way?”

Mycroft fixed him with a _look_. “I’ll pretend you did _not_ just ask me that, little brother. For the good of your perception of your own intelligence.”

“Right!” John said quickly. “Thank you, Mycroft, that’s—very nice of you to say, really. Appreciate it. Both of us, _don’t we?_ ”

Sherlock glared. John glared back.

Sherlock scowled and reached for his violin. “Oh, yes,” he drawled. 

John rolled his eyes and turned to Mycroft. “Don’t mind him, he’s just annoyed that you’re right. Would you like a drink now?”

“Alcohol has calories,” Sherlock offered casually, tightening a string. “Lots and lots of them.”

“Scotch, if you please,” Mycroft said with a tight smile. 

And scotch it was, nursed innocently, while everybody else arrived, Mila was thoroughly cooed over, and food was eaten, and John refilled enough glasses that he didn’t really register Mycroft’s passing through his hands - at least not until he remembered to look at Mycroft and found him hilariously, undeniably sloshed. 

“You should’ve seen him when he was a boy,” John hears him saying to Mrs Hudson. “He was positively nightmarish. This is nothing. _Nothing_ , I tell you.” His smile is suspiciously soft, completely at odds with his peevish words.

“Gosh, she’s so adorable,” Molly sighs from where she’s sitting on the sofa next to John, and he grins. These days, Molly seems to have eyes for little except Greg, and the fact that’s she’s noticed Mila at all is high praise indeed. 

“Yes, she is.” He takes a sip of his beer. “God help us all when she grows up. Sherlock’ll teach her how to make those puppy eyes he does and then she’ll be the most spoiled kid in the city.”

Molly giggles at his deadpan tone. “I doubt she’ll be interested in the normal kid things, spending so much time around Sherlock.”

“That’s what I’m afraid off. The kitchen’s barely been liberated, I’d prefer if I don’t ever have to have fights about the absence of fresh human liver next to butter ever again.” John chuckles fondly at the memory. He’ll never tell Sherlock, but occasionally, he rather misses the bloody surprises in the fridge. 

Across the room, Sherlock finishes _Oh Come All Ye Faithful_ with sparkly variations on the last few notes and lowers his violin. He turns and looks over the room with a faint frown. “What time is it?”

Mila catches the paper ball again. She screeches with joy and starts tearing it to pieces. 

“Well, looks like we need a fresh diversion,” Mary comments with a grin, and Greg picks himself off the floor. She glances at her wrist. “Almost nine. Isn’t that a watch on your hand, darling?”

Sherlock purses his lips. “Just thought I’d check twice,” he says. 

“Bored already?” Greg locates his plate and helps himself to a new mince pie. 

“If he were bored, you’d have already been informed extensively,” John pipes up, and Sherlock’s smile’s warm enough for him to feel it all across the room. Helplessly, he smiles back, then watches Sherlock put his violin down and bend to pick Mila up.

“So the paper’s better than the presents, is it?” Mila tears off another piece of it from the ball and offers it to Sherlock with a serious expression. Sherlock accepts it with an equally grave face. “Thank you. You’ll like the presents better tomorrow, I bet.”

The doorbell rings.

“Aren’t we all here?” Mrs Hudson raises her eyebrows. “We’re hardly a big bunch, it’s not like we could forget anyone.”

“I’ll get it,” Sherlock says, and he’s thudding down the stairs with Mila in tow before anybody can at least express surprise at Sherlock, of all people, voluntarily getting the door.

There’s the sound of the front door opening and closing, and then muted talking. Mila emits another high-pitched squeak. Two sets of feet start up the stairs.

“Really, Mr Holmes, it’s Christmas,” says a smoky, smooth female voice. “It’s bad enough I’ve got to wander around in this weather, and now it seems I’m crashing your party.”

“Never mind that,” Sherlock answers, and John hears the smile still in his voice. “You’re not crashing anything. You’re invited.”

“I still don’t see why we couldn’t meet some other day,” the woman says, and then she comes through the door. She’s tall, almost enough to dwarf Sherlock behind her, and walks with an easy, sauntering grace, hands in her coat pockets and back ramrod straight despite her age. Her curly hair’s white as a cloud, in elegant contrast with her deep red coat and dark, lined face. 

John automatically gets up. “Good evening,” he blurts out, and blushes on top. 

Sherlock steps from behind her. “Miss Margaret McKinnon,” he announces. “I’d introduce everybody to you, but—”

“ _Maggie?_ ” John turns his head and sees Mrs Hudson get up, gripping the armchair’s headrest hard. She looks worryingly pale. “Maggie,” she repeats, voice shaky.

“Hello, Martha,” the stranger says gently. She pulls her hands out of her pockets. “Merry Christmas.”

Mrs Hudson makes it across the room so fast John suddenly understands how she managed to make fools out of those CIA bastards. “Oh dear, Maggie,” she says, voice cracking, and then Miss McKinnon wraps her long hands around her and pulls her close.

Even if he hasn’t a clue about what’s going on, John sees the way Miss McKinnon’s face twists in pain before she bends it over the top of Mrs Hudson’s head, and he quickly looks away. Whatever is happening, it’s too intimate to be gawked at. He sits back down and seeks out Sherlock instead, who’s now perched on an empty corner of the coffee table, smiling at John over Mila’s head in his arms.

“Sherlock, who’s she?” John keeps his voice as low as possible. 

“Mrs Hudson’s best friend,” Sherlock says quietly. “She mentioned her once. I admit I was—preoccupied at the time, shall we say, but I remembered it afterwards.”

John frowns. “Yeah, but who _is_ she?” He carefully keeps his eyes fixed on Sherlock’s face, but he still hears Mrs Hudson’s muffled sobs. “This seems a bit ... _excessive_ for a friend.”

“She was the chief bridesmaid at Mrs Hudson’s wedding before they drifted apart.” Sherlock suddenly seems terribly interested in the pattern of John’s jumper. “Purportedly she spent the entire day crying. Left the wedding early, too.”

“Oh,” John says faintly. 

Sherlock looks at him then, eyes soft. “Yes, my thoughts precisely.”

“You tracked her down and convinced her to come here tonight?” John turns his head to catch Molly smiling at Sherlock. “It’s a beautiful Christmas gift, Sherlock, it really is.”

“My god, Martha, will you sit down?” Miss McKinnon sounds rather thready.

Mrs Hudson sniffs. “Oh, I’m alright—”

“You don’t need another bad hip, not at our bloody age,” Miss McKinnon snaps, and John deems it safe to stop looking away. 

The two women are beaming at each other, hands wrapped around arms. Mrs Hudson seems a tad unsteady on her feet, though, and Molly jumps on her feet. 

“Here, take the sofa,” she offers, and John gets up quickly. 

The party reassembles: Mrs Hudson and Miss McKinnon on the sofa, everybody else on the other side of the room, sprawled over the armchairs, floor and hastily emptied chairs. John refreshes everyone’s drinks and conversations resume, if a bit loudly and pointedly at first. Mary, Sherlock, and Molly seem to have gotten into a dispute about the aging of post-mortem wounds on corpses, and the debate is already getting heated as John takes a dozing Mila up to her cot. 

When he returns downstairs, Mrs Hudson and Miss McKinnon are holding hands and talking in hushed voices, and John politely tries not to gawk too much. The corpse debate in front of the fireplace seems to have soured; Sherlock is sitting on the floor and pouting into his glass, while Mary and Molly talk over his head. Greg is attempting to talk to Mycroft about football, and the conversation’s so hilariously stilted John contents himself with laughing on the inside. He plonks himself down into his armchair and Sherlock immediately shifts to lean against his legs.

He tilts his head back and looks at John. “Remind me, why are we having this party?”

John grins and brushes his cheek with the backs of his fingers. “Because we love our friends and family?”

Sherlock grumbles something unintelligible and tilts his head forward to stick his nose into his glass again. John’s hand slides into his hair and the grumble takes on a happier tone. 

“Don’t know why,” Sherlock mutters. “Everybody’s being terrible. And loud.”

John snorts. “You poor thing.” He rubs Sherlock’s scalp gently. “We all annoy you so much, don’t we?”

Sherlock hums, his head lolling against John’s knee. “Immensely,” he says, the one visible corner of his mouth curling up into a smile. 

John doesn’t bother suppressing a stupidly fond smile. He winds a few curls around his fingers and tugs gently. Sherlock only hums again, a quieter, smoother sound, and John abruptly realizes that they’re essentially cuddling in a roomful of people, one of which is Mary, no less. Of course everybody already knows, but they’ve hardly been flaunting it.

John takes a deep breath and looks up. Mycroft and Greg are stumbling through vague remarks about footy, but Mary catches his eye, nodding to something Molly’s telling her, and follows the line of his arm down to Sherlock’s head. John sees a faint shade of sadness cross her face, and then she looks him in the eyes again and gives him a firm smile. John returns it, relieved. 

“Mr Holmes,” Miss McKinnon says, and John turns his head. She looks smaller without her coat, smiling down at Sherlock. “Would you mind introducing me to your Martha here?”

“Your Martha - _what?_ ” 

Sherlock’s nonplussed. “Of course.” He waves a vague hand. “Margaret McKinnon, this is my ... my John. Doctor John. Also Captain John. Absolutely lovely.”

John blinks down at him, then reaches for Sherlock’s glass. “Enough of that,” he says firmly. Sherlock relinquishes the alcohol without protest, but John’s hand is captured in the process. He has to let go of Sherlock’s hair in order to save the glass from toppling over and safely set it on the side table. He wonders when exactly did Sherlock find time to even get drunk.

“Lovely to meet you, Doctor Captain John.” Miss McKinnon offers her hand, and John reaches up to shake it. 

“Just John, please.” he says. Sherlock squeezes his other hand.

“I did it right, didn’t I?” he asks, grinning up at Miss McKinnon and then John. “Merry Christmas.”

Miss McKinnon laughs lightly. “I’d say you did splendidly, Mr Holmes. Thank you very much.”

“Maggie,” Mrs Hudson calls. She’s standing beside the door. “I’ve a bottle of gin I’ve been saving. Won’t you come downstairs with me? See some pictures of Florida.”

John blinks. That was a want-to-come-in-for-some-coffee if he ever saw one. 

“Course I will.” Miss McKinnon looks back at him with a smile. “I’ll leave you two to it, John. Merry Christmas.”

“Merry Christmas,” John says faintly. Miss McKinnon collects her coat and vanishes through the door with a short “Good night!” to the room in general, and Mrs Hudson beams at him, cheeks flushed. 

“Do excuse us, John dear, we have an awful lot to talk about, I’m sure you understand.”

“Yes, yes, of course.” John gives her an encouraging smile. “Don’t let us keep you.”

Once the door closes behind her, Sherlock lets out a peal of triumphant laughter. “I’m a bloody genius,” he crows. 

“Yeah,” John murmurs, leaning over his head. He may not be the one for flaunting it, but he absolutely has to kiss Sherlock right now. Just a bit. “You bloody are.”

***

These days, Mycroft usually either calls Sherlock’s phone and the two of them bicker for what seems an unreasonable amount of time before Mycroft finally spits out whatever case he has for his brother, or he simply shows up on their doorstep, visibly pleased that he always manages to interrupt a meal or a conversation. 

In any case, John hasn’t been kidnapped in years; but today, on a perfectly ordinary afternoon, Mycroft has apparently decided to break that streak of politeness and snatch him off the street, barely ten steps away from the door of his clinic. 

It’s also raining buckets, so a ride in a quietly luxurious limousine is vastly preferable to a splashy stroll through the streets and the damp, annoyed afternoon crowds on the Tube. John is going to be angry anyway, though, if only for the principle of it. Kidnapping is _not_ on, not even if Mycroft I-Am-Not-The-Government Holmes is doing it.

And smiling serenely at him while he’s doing it. “Do stop glaring at me, John. You hate it when it’s raining.”

John crosses his arms across his chest and huffs. “You just kidnapped me, Mycroft. _Again_. Let me remind you, a month ago you were shitfaced and misty-eyed over your little brother in my living room. Your days of intimidating me would be officially over, if you’d ever managed it in the first place, which you didn’t.”

Incredibly enough, Mycroft’s face seems to be turning a very discreet shade of red. “There is no need for posturing, I assure you. I merely wanted to give you the good news in person. I would’ve dropped by your home, but it’s been a trying day. I’m sure you can appreciate my desire to evade my brother’s attention.”

John frowns. “Good news?”

Mycroft clicks open his briefcase and hands over a thick yellow envelope. “Personal identification, driving license, et cetera. Sherlock officially exists again. It has been decided that he’s of more worth to the Crown alive than dead.” He gives a thin, sardonic smile. “We can all only die once, after all. Not that it is always as appreciated as it should be. He’ll be called on, if and when the need arises. But he’ll be a treasured asset, not a criminal to be dealt with.”

John clenches his fingers and the thick paper rustles quietly. “Mycroft,” he says, “what _the fuck_ are you talking about?”

The astonishing sight of Mycroft Holmes growing worryingly pale is lost in the rising white noise in John’s head. “Oh,” he says delicately. “I assumed - I should not have. You didn’t know.”

“Know _what?_ ” He drops the envelope into his lap before his clenching hands can wrinkle it further. “Are you saying—no. You’re not saying—”

“That Sherlock’s been living on stolen time for the last year?” Mycroft clears his throat, fingers skittering on his trousers before he laces them together over the top of his knee. “I did my very best, John, but I’m afraid the government doesn’t appreciate individuals taking it upon themselves to drastically solve as complicated a problem as Magnussen was. Letting my brother live at home while his fate was debated was the only immediate concession I was able to secure. Even so, he was observed closely. He wouldn’t have been able to set foot outside of London without being taken in immediately.”

John licks his dry lips. “He knew about all this.”

Mycroft sighs.

“Yeah.” John swallows. “His own sentence. Of course he did.”

“I really must apologize,” Mycroft tells the car window. “I was certain he must’ve told you.”

“ _Jesus_.” John squeezes his eyes shut. But he never even asked, did he? Sherlock was back at Baker Street, John was busy being a dad, and he never thought to ask what exactly had happened. Sherlock was home, and John assumed that meant the matter was resolved, and he would always be home. “God. I’m—fuck.” He tries to reconcile this new concept of temporariness with the last year, every lovely day of it, and—Jesus, the last heady, delirious six weeks—it could’ve ended any fucking moment, mercilessly, without any warning.

“Are you quite alright, John?” and fuck, he must look terrible if it’s making Mycroft sound this concerned. 

John inhales sharply and forces his eyes to open. “No. I’m not fucking alright. Just—take me home, will you? I need to murder Sherlock.”

“Of course,” Mycroft murmurs. He raps once on the partition with his knuckles, and the car speeds up.

The next ten minutes are excruciating. Mycroft spends them staring at the screen of his phone, but he’s obviously horrifically uncomfortable. Any other time, John would enjoy watching him squirm, but he’s too busy breathing through the shrill panic that is threatening to spill out of his chest. Ridiculous, he tells himself. It’s alright now. Things have been put to rights. Nobody’ll march into Baker Street to drag Sherlock away.

But it could’ve happened. It could’ve. These days, he wakes up with Sherlock’s head on his chest more often than not, and he still needs several minutes before the hysterical wonder of Sherlock’s gently fluttering eyelashes, right there, lets him breathe. Just knowing that there was potential for it to be taken away from him is—

“John,” Mycroft says hesitantly, “I understand you are angry, I truly do. But - you do know my brother. I believe he had his reasons to keep this to himself, and it was not out of lack of regard for you.”

John swallows thickly. “That’s nice. Please stop talking.”

Miraculously, Mycroft does. 

John gets out of the car in front of 221 and ignores Mycroft’s murmured request that he calm down before he does something rash. He lets himself in, walks up the stairs without feeling the wood under his feet, and then he opens their door.

“You’re a genius,” Sherlock’s saying to Mila. She’s got the knees of his trousers caught in two tiny iron fists, and he’s making short steps backwards, and she’s walking - slow, clumsy, supported - but she’s walking. “Look at you. My darling girl, you’re a genius.” He looks up and beams at John. “Look! What did I say? Not a year old yet and she’s walking.”

Mila makes a happy sound from the floor, swaying left and right around Sherlock’s calves.

“Hi,” John manages. Something’s rising up in his throat, something that feels like a sob wrapped around a laugh, and he presses the back of a fist to his mouth and tries to swallow it back down.

Sherlock’s smile fades. “Something’s wrong. What’s wrong?”

The envelope is hidden in the shadow between his leg and the doorframe. Wordlessly, John lifts it up.

Sherlock goes pale so fast John would be concerned, if there were any space left in his mind for it. “Mycroft—”

“He thought I knew,” John says through numbed lips. “He was so happy to be giving me the good news.” 

For a long moment, Sherlock just looks at him, eyes wide and shattered like John hasn’t seen them since—god, since that horrible carriage, and then he bends down slowly and gently detaches Mila’s hands from his trousers. He lifts her up and then sets her back down in the middle of scattered toys that litter the carpet in front of the fireplace. 

Then he straightens back up and makes a vague, helpless gesture. His hands are shaking. “You never asked,” he mutters. “And if I told you, you’d—worry, and—”

“And in your book that means I don’t have a right to know? After everything that happened, I still don’t get to know?” John throws the envelope down on the coffee table. “I watched you board that fucking plane and pretended I didn’t know you were being sent to die, so you thought you’d just let me be relieved after? Let me believe everything was _just fine?_ ”

“You knew about that?” Sherlock looks aside and sighs. “Mary. Of course.”

John grits his teeth. “Sherlock, I swear to fucking god—”

“None of this was supposed to happen, John!” Sherlock waves his hands around impatiently. “You were married, you had your pretty new life and one day, your useless junkie friend would disappear, that’s all.”

“ _That’s all?_ ” John laughs; a sharp, angry, ugly sound. “You’re a fucking bastard. Because that worked out so well last time, did it?”

“You had Mary!” Sherlock snaps, “and you would be happy, in time, and you have a daughter now—”

“And I suppose you don’t?” John hisses, stepping forward, and Sherlock twitches as if slapped. “How about my bloody ex-wife that you take out for cupcakes and tea? Our landlady, who loves you like a son? Want me to go on?”

Sherlock turns towards the window with a loud, unsteady exhale, and doesn’t say a thing.

“And the last month?” John feels that sob trembling in his throat again and forces it back down. “You didn’t think I needed to know, at least now?”

Sherlock huffs out a weak, dry laugh and hangs his head. “Oh, I did. Every day. You overestimate my moral sense, I’m afraid. Fucking a dead man hardly makes for a good relationship.”

John stares at the back of his head, at the hair he’s pulled and petted so much his hands flawlessly remember the feel of it. “Is that what we were doing, then? Sleeping in the same bed with you clinging to me all night long, and every bloody morning I’ve been late for work because you just wanted to kiss, and last Sunday?” Last Sunday—Sherlock had licked honey from his fingers one time too many, and John went to his knees under their kitchen table, and five minutes later he had Sherlock’s thighs around his neck and Sherlock’s cock so far down his throat he’d forgotten how to breathe, and Sherlock made terrible, broken noises and then came in complete shocked silence and John—John swallowed it all, kept on sucking him, because the thought of stopping was unbearable, squeezed his eyes shut and tried to make his mouth gentle while Sherlock squirmed weakly under him, his faint moans wrapping themselves around John’s head like a delirious fog; he disappeared into it, saturated with Sherlock’s taste and scent and feel, couldn’t stop, _couldn’t stop_ , and he only snapped out of it because Sherlock came for the second time, shaking and wailing into a mouthful of his own collar. Memory’s a funny thing, but John thinks he’ll remember it perfectly for the rest of his life: Sherlock pulled him off by his hair, and John gasped for air, couldn’t even keep his eyes open, let Sherlock manhandle him into his lap and barely manage to touch him before he came so hard every nerve in his body felt as if set on fire. They clung to each other afterwards, swaying unsteadily on that bloody uncomfortable chair for long dizzy minutes, before they managed to pick themselves up and stumble into bed. 

Sherlock turns around, eyes on the floor. “Just tell me if there’s something I can say.” He sounds defeated, shattered in a way John’s never seen him. “If there isn’t, then it hardly matters.”

“If you honestly think that I want to leave you, you’re a bigger idiot than I thought,” John says, weary to the bones, but then again, it’s not like they ever actually bothered to have this conversation. “I told you, haven’t I?”

Sherlock raises his head. “Yes. But you can. Leave, if you want. I could hardly blame you.”

For a very long moment, John fervently wants to punch him in the face again. He breathes and flexes his hands. “What I want,” he says carefully, “is for you to stop trying to leave me - leave _us_ , damn you - because if ever do it again, I’ll murder you myself. Just stop—stop deciding that I’d be better off without you.”

Sherlock stares at him. “But you would,” he says despairingly. 

John sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose. “I don’t care. Do _you_ want me to leave?”

“Don’t be an idiot,” Sherlock snaps.

“Well, then.” John straightens up. “You asked for it, and I promised you, didn’t I? Why don’t you promise me now?”

Sherlock opens his mouth, then closes it again. His jaw works. “What would you like?” he asks at last. 

“Promise you won’t leave me.” John swallows. “Not until we’re both just two slabs of meat in black body bags.”

Sherlock looks at him, wide-eyed, his lips parted, like John’s words have sliced something open between them and the insides have been brought out into the light. “That’s not very romantic,” he says faintly. “But yes.”

John stops breathing. “Yes?” 

“I promise.” Hesitantly, Sherlock steps closer. “Until the body bags.” 

John exhales, stale air and most of the fear rushing out at last. “Good.” He opens his arms. “Come here and kiss me.”

Sherlock does, very gently, with cold, trembling fingers on John’s cheeks. John covers them with his own hands and rubs the warmth back into them. 

***

It’s a month to Mila’s first birthday, and John leaves Mila with Sherlock and goes to get some groceries. He descends the stairs to the ground floor, taking care to be as loud as his feet can possibly manage. The foyer is a dangerous zone these days, since Miss McKinnon is always either being enthusiastically greeted or said goodbye to by Mrs Hudson, and John’s already walked in on them more times than he could ever feel comfortable with. Miss McKinnon seems not to care a whit about it and Mrs Hudson hardly even notices anything else in the room, but it makes John feel weirdly embarrassed, sort of like whenever he’d accidentally caught his parents kissing. 

And kiss they do, up against Mrs Hudson’s door, with all the cheerful defiance of two people making up for lost time. The first time it happened, they haven’t even noticed John coming through the front door; he’d tiptoed past them and up the stairs, his ears burning, and escaped into their flat. Sherlock was behind the kitchen table, reading the newspaper, and lifted his eyebrows at him.

“Mrs Hudson seems to be in love,” John got out, and Sherlock, damn him, actually had the gall to grin at him.

“Obviously. Excellent, isn’t it?”

John pursed his lips and turned away. He started making tea, and his blushing ears barely cooled off when Sherlock folded his newspaper and leant forward with a somber expression.

“You might want to avoid venturing downstairs most days between eight and ten in the evening,” he said. “They appear to have a schedule.”

John choked on his tea and spilt half of the mug’s contents down his front. 

“The sound carries into the foyer,” Sherlock added with a terrifying smile. “Quite surprising, her door should be better at noise control—”

John slammed his mug down and escaped into the bathroom with his scalding blush and shirt, and even through the closed door, he still heard Sherlock chuckling in the kitchen. Apparently they really did need better doors.

John gets to the bottom of the stairs. The foyer seems to be blessedly empty, but just in case, he carefully peers over his left shoulder. Mrs Hudson’s door is shut and deserted, not a single pair of giggling old ladies kissing in sight.

Relieved, John walks towards the front door, pulling his gloves out of his coat pocket as he goes, but just as he puts his hand on the knob, the bell rings. 

John raises his eyebrows and pulls the door open. 

“Well, that was quick,” Mary comments with a wide smile. “Going somewhere?

John shrugs and stuffs his gloves back in his pocket. “Groceries. It can wait.” He moves aside to let her in. “How are you?”

She turns around. “I’m _brilliant_ ,” she says, and there’s a sharp, violent joy in her face, the kind of which John has only seen on her face once before, on the day she gave birth to Mila. “Let’s go up for a cuppa and I’ll tell you why.”

“Yeah, of course, after you,” and she fairly skips up the stairs. John follows her slowly, starting to smile himself in the face of her infectious mood. 

“Sherlock!” he hears her exclaim, and then he steps into their living room behind her and catches the end of Sherlock’s bright, fast glance.

“Ah,” he says, and gets up from the floor where he’s been patiently holding out spoons of oatmeal for Mila, restless and unwilling to sit down for longer than a minute at a time. Ever since she’s learnt to walk, the meals are a problem, but Sherlock scoffs at calling it that. “That’s my girl.” He holds his arms out and Mary laughs and hugs him. “Well done,” Sherlock tells her over Mila’s indignant squeak at the sudden lack of a heaping spoon waiting for her. 

Whatever is going on, of course Sherlock knows about it and John doesn’t. “Anybody mind telling me what’s going on?” 

Mary lets go of Sherlock and bends to lift Mila into her arms and kiss her cheeks. “My darling,” she says. “My lovely, darling girl.”

“Mary!” John wouldn’t admit it in a thousand years, but it’s dangerously close to a whine. “What’s going on?”

Mary turns to him, her cheek pressed against Mila’s. She flashes a bright, feral grin that John’s never seen on her before. “I got the job.”

“The job.” John frowns slightly. “The job you were having all those interviews for?” She was excited about it, he remembers, but, well ... not like _this_. 

“No. Well, yes.” Mary hoists Mila higher up on her hip and heads towards the kitchen. “Sherlock, bring her breakfast, would you? And I want that tea.”

John beats her to putting the kettle on, and Mary sits down. She puts Mila on the table, facing her. “So you got the job,” he prompts. “But - you didn’t get a job?”

Sherlock puts the bowl and the spoon into Mary’s hands and she smiles at him in thanks. “I got the job,” she says, spooning up some oatmeal. “But it wasn’t a management job like I said it was.” She starts making an airplane with the spoon and miraculously, Mila stills and starts intently following the spoon with her eyes. 

Sherlock is smirking at him from where he’s taking mugs out of the cabinets and John barely resists the urge to squirm in impatience. “Well, what kind of job is it, then?”

Mary pops the spoon in Mila’s mouth and looks up with a sly grin. “Well,” she says, “I now occupy a minor position in the British government. _Very_ minor.”

John’s mouth drops open. “ _Mycroft?_ ”

“You’d be amazed how keen was he to hire her when I recommended her,” Sherlock quips and winks at Mary, who practically giggles.

“Admittedly it’s a desk job,” she says and sends another spoon flying. “I’m not going back in the field, obviously. It’ll be code-breaking, hacking, translation, surveillance ... things like that. A very respectable, nine-to-five job.” Mila makes a high noise around her mouthful and Mary smiles down at her. “Who knows what’ll happen in a few years, though.”

John closes his mouth. A curious feel of familiarity comes over him - almost deja vu, but not quite, because that time, there was no Sherlock and Mila was barely able to smile and most of all Mary was pale and miserable and clinging to her tea, and now she’s absolutely beaming - at Mila, at John, over her shoulder at the smugly grinning Sherlock while he taps his fingers on the counter while the kettle hasn’t boiled yet. There are a thousand things he wants to ask, _needs_ to ask (What if something happens to you? What if you can’t balance the job and Mila? What if something happens to you at the same time something happens to Sherlock and me? What if—), but the one that jumps to the front of his tongue is remarkably simple: “Are you going to be happy?”

Mary looks at him for a very long moment, winter morning sun caught in her green eyes. “I have a beautiful daughter,” she says at last, “and people that love me - _me_ , with all that entails - and I’ll be doing something I’ve always loved.”

“I’m curious if you’ll think the same after a month of working with my tedious brother,” Sherlock says with that horrifyingly adorable scrunch between his eyebrows, and Mary reaches behind her for his arm and pulls. Sherlock bends down to her and she hooks an arm around his neck and kisses his cheek. 

“Thank you, darling. Not that I haven’t said it yet, but it bears repeating.”

“My pleasure.” Sherlock straightens up, winks at John, and goes back to the kettle. 

Mary looks at John again. “Of course I’m going to be happy,” she says. Another airplane is already dancing towards Mila’s mouth. “I think I already am.”

**Author's Note:**

> My personal headcanon for Margaret is Nichelle Nichols, but I really wanted her to be tall as well, so *shrugs* You're obviously welcome to imagine her as someone else. 
> 
> A word on John's and Sherlock's sexualities: again, you're obviously welcome to form your own interpretations. As far as my take on it goes: in this fic, John is bisexual, but has some pretty deep problems with it. However, I don't see him as someone who would have an identity crisis in the traditional sense of the word, so I did my best to imply it a bit differently. Sherlock is more of the 'gender is tedious' persuasion, and is definitely not a virgin, although as far as his previous partners and degree of experience goes, I'm drawing a blank. So, that's my two cents about it; please go and have fun with your own interpretations now :D


End file.
